Big Steps in Building: Get Rid Of Those Radiator Fins
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 03. 4.08
Studio Gang are very talented architects, and have shown that they know how to design for energy efficiency. and their Aqua project certainly is interesting. However every one of those balconies on each of eighty floors of highrise condos is a giant radiator fin, constantly losing heat to the cold Chicago winters. It isn't too terrific for comfort, either as the floors are freezing near the window walls and condensation can form on the ceiling. Hairline cracks due to thermal stress are also likely to form.
There are a few systems around that can provide a thermal break for a concrete cantilevered balcony, mostly from Europe, but they are expensive, a couple of hundred bucks a foot. One can see from the construction photos that they are probably not being used here.
As an architect, I love the look of this building. As a TreeHugger, I wonder how in this day and age we can still be permitting continuous floor to ceiling glass walls and eighty stories of radiator fin balconies in a "green" but cold city like Chicago.
How will they heat this thing twenty years from now? ::Daily Dose of Architecture
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Well, considering that they now have glass with extreemly good insulation charistics, and that natural sunlight can heat a building and reduce the need for lighting, floor to ceiling windows might be the wave of the future because, not despite, their energy efficency.
You've got a point there. Chicago has 6,639 heating degree days a year...
OTOH, the building looks fairly thick. It might have a fairly high need to reject heat for at least part of the day, even during the winter.
The fins might also be quite handy for cooling in the summer, too. Those fins could also have been deeper and continuous, so this is a lesser amount of cooling fins.
Have they published any energy modeling data?
Twenty years from now, Chicago might be warm, and everyone will wish they had fins.
the [un]plug building is way more innovative...however entirely unbuildable.
I'm currently introducing the original balcony insulator from Schöck in Canada (www.schoeck-canada.com). The biggest obstacle I face is, that the builders sell the appartments before the highrise is even build. The high demand for appartments, also as an investment object causes this run, without looking into the details of the execution of the structure. The customer wants hard wood flooring and a granite kitchen counter and for that they pay. No one is interested in the R-value for windows or the balcony. I also thought that LEED will favour our systems, but infact it seems to be only a nice paperwork. As long as the energy prices are so low in northern America and the clients buy what the marked provides, it will be doubtfull that there will be a change in thinking about energy efficiancy.
An other neglegted issue is the well-beeing. Imagine you stand bare foot infront of a non-insulated balcony in Chicago in a harsh winter- you will definitely need some boots in your appartment.
In Europe the question is not should I insulated the balcony or not, it is a question of which supplier to use.
1m of balcony insulater is arround 150 US$ ex-works. That is 450 US$ for one balcony roughly.