“We have seen many creative ways to re use old plastic bottles in recent years. Now adidas has developed and trialled proposals for a synthetic 3g American football pitch using 1.8m bottles.

Hopefully this test project is viable and can become the norm when natural grass is not an option.

Leisure and sports buildings traditionally use a lot of energy in cooling active spaces and heating water. We have been examining innovative ways of reducing the carbon footprint of these buildings, particularly within mixed use developments where unwanted heat can be reused for the benefit of others. Alongside the building services opportunities, the form, orientation and massing is a key part in forming the DNA of a sustainable and efficient building regardless of its use type.

Greater challenges are presented in modifying or extending existing leisure buildings with out dated inflexible arrangements and badly performing building services. But the embodied energy within the retained parts of the existing building forms a sustainable starting point in itself and demands even more creativity from us all.”

Paul Norbury, Director