1. People Feel Better
IN COLT CONDITIONS
Harnessing nature to make the built environment a better place
2. People Feel And Work Better
IN COLT CONDITIONS
Solar Exposure
Weather Conditions
Internal Climate
N
W
E
S
Building Orientation
Building Location
Materials
Use of Building
3. People Are Safe
IN COLT CONDITIONS
Colt Priorities:
Safe Evacuation
Safe Firefighting
6. Natural Ventilation
FOR INDUSTRIAL BUILDINGS
Colt Labyrinth Gravity Ventilation System
Natural Cooling
Temperature Control
Clean Atmosphere
Virtually No Energy Use
Low Installation Cost
Low Cost of Operation
Sor Norge Aluminium, Norway
7. Climate Control
NATURAL COOLING FOR INDUSTRIAL & COMMERCIAL BUILDINGS
Colt Coolstream
Natural Cooling
Energy Efficient
Low Installation Cost
Low Cost of Operation
Snel BV, Huissen, Holland
8. Climate Control
AIR CONDITIONING THAT IS KIND TO THE ENVIRONMENT
Colt Caloris WRF
Energy Efficient
Low Cost of Operation
Low Environmental Impact
Individual Controls
Quiet Operation
Space Saver
9. Smoke Control
CAR PARK VENTILATION SYSTEMS
Colt Jetstream impulse fans and Cyclone induction fans
Effective Smoke Extraction
Safe Evacuation
No Ductwork Required
Space saving
Golden Square Shopping Centre Car Park, Warrington, UK
10. Colt Conditions
TODAY AND TOMORROW
Colt Service:
Maintains Colt Conditions:
Programmed Maintenance
Performance
Breakdown Assistance
Safety
Design Support
Energy Efficiency
Maintenance Training
11. Colt: Who We Are
‘People are the greatest asset a company can have.’
Jack O’Hea
People Feel Better in Colt Conditions
12. Colt: Who We Are
‘The heartbeat of the business has been innovation and
new ideas.’
Local wherever you are - backed up by a global organisation
Represented in 50 countries
850
Manufacturing on 5 continents
£ 160 M / € 184 M
employees
turnover (2011)
A sustainable built environment and healthy buildings: that is what Colt is about.
We harness nature to make the built environment a better place, by creating energy efficient buildings and an internal environment that is healthy, comfortable and safe.
In this presentation we will tell you how we do that.
Let’s begin with why people feel better in Colt conditions.
The internal climate of a building is affected by various factors, such as its location, orientation, the materials used in its construction and what it is used for. The building interacts with the environment, so that its internal climate is affected by seasonal changes in weather conditions and temperature.
We design solar shading, natural ventilation, climate control, and natural lighting systems that work together, taking into account all these factors, to create a comfortable and healthy environment for the building’s occupiers.
People are also safer in Colt conditions.
In a fire, smoke is the greatest threat, as it prevents people from escaping and makes it difficult for fire fighters to see where the source of the fire is. Colt pioneered the science of smoke control, which is the key to a safe evacuation and to minimising damage to the building.
First of all, we prevent the movement of smoke and heat using smoke curtains or pressure differential systems. Then, the smoke is channelled in a predetermined direction, so that it doesn’t spread to other areas of the building. Finally, the smoke is removed from the building with our powered or natural ventilation systems.
At Colt we design our systems so that they work together to harness natural elements and make them work for the building, so that it makes the most efficient use of energy. The Grunewald manufacturing building in Germany is a perfect example of how we do this.
Large expanses of glass maximise lighting. This, however, also increases heat gain in the summer and heat loss in the winter.
We reduce heat gain by creating a second skin on the building’s façade with glass louvres. A Colt control system calculates the progression of the sun and alters the position of the louvers to provide optimal light levels while reducing glare and heat gain. When closed, the louvres form a second skin, increasing the building’s insulation.
Automatically controlled glazed ventilators installed in the upper section of the glass façade provide passive cooling.
- Using the whole of the south facing glass wall to generate energy, covering it with a photovoltaic glass facade, further enhances the building’s energy efficiency.
And there is more to what we can do: architects can make striking architectural features of Colt systems, adding a powerful visual statement to their design.
The EWE Arena in Oldenburg, in Germany, is a good example. Architect Arat Siegel Schust wanted to create a visually striking structure for the stadium, while making a statement about energy efficiency. He designed this glazed circular building: the challenge was to turn this structure with vast expanses of glass into an energy efficient building.
Colt came up with the design of the moveable solar shading wall with photovoltaic cells, to reduce the building’s cooling requirements and generate electricity. The solar shading wall moves every half hour following the position of the sun. 18 segments of the wall contain PV toughened laminated glazing panels that can generate a power output of 14.76 kWp. The wall runs on a stainless steel roller system, also designed by Colt, fixed to the exterior of the building.
The architect’s objective was achieved: striking visual effect, and energy efficiency that can be seen in action with the moveable wall.
We design systems for very different types of buildings: office buildings, hotels , high-rise buldings, shopping centres, car parks, hotels, industrial buildings… each requires a different approach and a different mix of technologies.
For example, industrial buildings that house manufacturing processes that generate high heat, such as aluminium smelters, present a difficult challenge when it comes to ensuring a good indoor climate for the people working in the facility. Colt gravity ventilation systems provide the perfect solution, guaranteeing effective temperature control and clean atmosphere on working level. And they offer multiple advantages: virtually no energy consumption, minimal maintenance, silent operation, low operating costs, long life span and low installation cost.
Warehouses and manufacturing are large open spaces where machinery will be producing heat, so that cooling will be the main issue to resolve.
The Colt Coolstream natural cooling system is particularly well suited to this type of buildings that are too large for air conditioning to be cost effective. This system is based on the principle of evaporative cooling to remove heat from the building. The process involves drawing the hot air from the building through a wet media, which results in an exchange of energy and a significant reduction in temperaure.
Evaporative cooling is 4 to 7 times more economical that conventional systems and its installation costs are much lower. In addition, evaporative cooling continuously supplies fresh air, thus maintaining excellent air quality. In fact, it can be operated throughout the year to ensure constant air quality, with the cooling function only activated when necessary.
In hotels, it is important to give the guests some control over the temperature in their room while ensuring the whole system is energy efficient and easy to maintain, to keep operating costs down for the hotel owner.
In this case, the ideal solution is a Caloris WRF (water and refrigerant flow) water source heat pump air conditioning system. It offers de-centralised, local control, adjustable by individual room occupants. The indoor horizontal units are amongst the quietest on the market, adding to the hotel guests’ comfort.
The system uses water to distribute energy between the indoor heat pumps and in the rooms. This means that only a minimal amount of refrigerant charge is used only in the external central pump. As a result, there is no need for the hotel to install a costly refrigerant leak detection system in each room, or carry out the internal pipe-work inspections required by F-gas regulations. This also results in freeing up space in linen rooms, which would have needed to house refrigerant-to-water heat exchangers in refrigerant-based systems.
The Caloris WRF is also ideal for office buildings, schools, residential buildings, or sports and leisure facilities, and it can be combined with natural ventilation to optimise energy efficiency and air quality.
Car parks present their own challenge, and over the past few years, the strategy for ventilating underground facilities has changed dramatically. Traditional ducted systems have been replaced by `jet´, `impulse´ and/or `induction´ systems. These use small fan units positioned around the car park to direct the smoke towards the extract point.
The Golden Square Shopping Centre in Warrington offers a good example of these new systems. This shopping mall, which opened its doors for the first time in May 2007 as part of the regeneration of the centre of Warrington, is using a Colt car park ventilation system with Jetstream impulse fans. The Service road tunnel is ventilated with Cyclone induction fans and special reversible Jetstream impulse fans.
Once all these systems are installed, they need regular servicing to be maintained in top condition, just like a car. A programmed maintenance service will also extend their life cycle. That is why we offer our customers tailored maintenance regimes, so that their climate control, solar shading and smoke control systems continue to perform at their peak. This will also ensure the building’s continued sustainability and energy efficiency.
A building’s systems on occasion may experience a technical problem, and we operate an emergency call-out service to make sure that when it happens, downtime is cut down to a minimum.
To conclude, a few words about who we are and why we are good at what we do.
Colt was born as a family business, founded by Jack O’Hea, in 1931. He had a clear vision for his new company and from the start he set down the guiding principles that would inform the way he run the business. These guiding principles are at the core of what we do to this day.
Jack O’Hea believed that people were the greatest asset any company could have, and acted accordingly.
At Colt we have remained true to this belief. People are important in the way we run the company. But there is more to it than that. People are at the centre of what we do as a business: after all, everything we do contributes to creating a healthy, comfortable and safe environment for the people who use large buildings. That is why our slogan perfectly expresses what we are about and what we believe in: People feel better in Colt conditions.
Innovation has been at the heart of Colt’s activities ever since its beginning.
Over the years we have introduced many technical innovations that have changed our industry. For example, Colt introduced the concept of fire ventilation for single-storey industrial buildings, turning conventional wisdom on its head. We designed the world’s first smoke ventilation system in 1954, and have since funded much of the public research that is the basis for many National and European regulations.
We have also applied our innovative approach to the way we have expanded our business around the world, setting up companies entirely staffed by nationals and running them as local businesses, rather than exporting our business model and personnel. And we started doing this in the 1960s, when such an approach was to say the least unconventional.
Today Colt is represented in more than 50 countries around the world, through branches and distributors. Our products are manufactured in the UK, the Netherlands, Germany, Singapore, New Zealand, China, South Africa, Brazil, Argentina and Saudi Arabia. This widespread presence around the world enables us to understand the specific requirements of our customers, wherever they are based, and respond quickly their demands.
With a team that today counts 850 employees, our approach has enabled us to maintain a steady growth over the years, achieving a 190 Million Euro turnover in 2009.
A favourite phrase of Jack O’Hea was “the sky’s the limit”. It encapsulates his true entrepreneurial spirit, which has inspired the generations of Colt people that have followed and is still strong today. We are in a unique position in our industry, with a breadth of expertise that spans different specialties that can work together to the greater advantage of our customers, and we are always looking for new ways of helping them.