World-first sustainable office retrofit begins at new CISL headquarters

The Entopia Building, a retrofitted 1930s Telephone Exchange at 1 Regent Street, Cambridge, will be transformed over the next 10 months into an ultra-low carbon sustainability hub, and new home for CISL as it scales up business, government and academic leadership, collaboration and innovation to accelerate the inclusive global transition.

The building will house CISL’s Cambridge-based staff, currently spread across five buildings, and provide a dynamic virtual hub for its offices in Brussels and Cape Town, partner organisations in China, Australia and the UAE, its global corporate partners, alumni, fellows, associates, researchers and visiting academics.

A dedicated Accelerator and Sustainability Hub will support small businesses and start-ups via collaborations, capacity building and knowledge transfer between industry experts, researchers, and major companies.

The Entopia Building is the vision of CISL Founder Director Dame Polly Courtice who has led the Institute for more than 30 years - inspiring companies, policymakers and civil society leaders to take leadership for sustainability.

Dame Polly Courtice, Founder Director, CISL said: “CISL’s new HQ at The Entopia Building will exemplify and enable our mission to support and inspire the leadership and innovation we need to transition to sustainable economy. Our aim is to create a highly collaborative and sustainable workspace to bring together Cambridge’s academic and innovation communities with our network of companies and sustainability leaders to accelerate solutions to global sustainability challenges.”

The Entopia Building aims to be an international exemplar for sustainable office retrofits, demonstrating how an existing office building can be made highly energy efficient in its redevelopment and use, while supporting the enhanced wellbeing of staff and visitors. The building will also provide a base for the Institute’s digital learning programmes which reach more than 4,000 executives each year through remote learning. High tech video conferencing facilities and collaborative digital platforms will enable its network of 16,000 alumni, fellows and associates to collaborate and engage with its work remotely.

In 2019 the University of Cambridge became the first university in the world to adopt a 1.5 degrees Science Based Target for carbon reduction, committing itself to reduce its energy-related carbon emissions to absolute zero by 2048, with an ambition to achieve this by 2038 - a decade early. In 2020 the University announced it aims to divest from all direct and indirect investments in fossil fuels by 2030 as part of its ambition to cut greenhouse gas emissions across its investment portfolio by 2038.

Professor Stephen Toope, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cambridge said: “The Entopia Building will become the most sustainable premises in the University of Cambridge estate, marking a major contribution to our world-leading target to eliminate our emissions and putting the wellbeing of its occupants – and wider society - at its heart.”

The £12.8m retrofit has been supported by a £6m donation from green tech leaders Envision Group and a £3m grant from the European Regional Development fund (ERDF), which is also funding the operation of a sustainability hub and small business and start-up accelerator for three years. The University has invested its own funds in the project alongside an internal grant from its internal Energy & Carbon Reduction Project.

The building name references the Entopia concept developed by Envision Group to shape a future where access to clean, secure and affordable energy is available to all.

Lei Zhang, Founder and CEO, Envision Group said: “Envision Energy is pleased to support the University of Cambridge in making the Institute for Sustainability Leadership’s new headquarters an exemplar sustainability retrofit of international importance. We hope this project will lead others to be bolder in pursuing the goal of net zero as they invest in upgrading the world’s buildings and infrastructure.”

Eighty percent of UK buildings that will exist in 2050 have already been built, so although it is easier to develop new properties with high sustainability credentials, a major challenge for societies will be to retrofit existing building stock to meet climate change targets, and ensure they are fit for purpose in the future.

As a world-first, The Entopia Building aims to achieve multiple sustainable building certifications, including BREEAM (Outstanding), the Passivhaus ‘Enerphit’ standard, Well (Gold) certification, alongside the application of ‘circular economy’ principles to minimise the volume and impact of natural and made-made resources used in the building.

The project brief was developed by CISL’s Professor John French, who previously led the design and build of the award-winning Enterprise Centre at the University of East Anglia, which is demonstrably one of the most sustainable office buildings in the UK. The Entopia Building aims to open to staff by the end of 2021.

Prof. John French, Senior Advisor, CISL said: “Delivering the vision of The Entopia Building project is only possible through leadership and collaboration that puts sustainability objectives top of the list of priorities, and constantly innovates to achieve it, while not compromising cost, quality or timeline. We hope this building will provide an exemplar for the built environment, as the world moves to meet its Paris Agreement ambition to limit global warming to 1.5C.”

Sustainability benchmarks for The Entopia Building:

• The deep green retrofit is projected to result in an 80% saving in whole-life carbon emissions (over 10,000 kg CO2e), compared to a standard office refurbishment.

• The retrofit will be carried out according to EnerPHit, the Passivhaus standard for refurbishment and one of the most stringent standards for energy retrofits. It will deliver 75% lower heating demand in comparison to an average office building, and airtightness at more than five times that required by building regulations.

• The Entopia Building is on track to gain world-leading sustainability and wellbeing certification from BREEAM (Outstanding) and the WELL Building Standard (Gold).

• The project is one of the first to reuse lighting from another building refurbishment, re-testing and re- warrantying more than 350 LED lights that were then reinstalled in The Entopia Building.

• Leftover furniture in the building has been diverted from landfill, avoiding 21,000 kg of CO2, with 21,600 kg of chairs, tables and storage cabinets donated to local communities. A third of the building’s paint needs have been covered by a donation from Dulux of paint made from 35% recycled paint content.

The project is being delivered through the University’s Estates Division by a team of leading sustainability-focused firms in the architectural, main contractor, project management and engineering disciplines, who understand the need for deep collaboration and innovation to achieve stretching sustainability targets.

CISL intends to share the case study of the exemplar high sustainability retrofit project for use in the wider building sector, both within and outside higher education. In this way, The Entopia Building will contribute to CISL’s mission to develop and provide leadership for a sustainable economy, paving the way for wider change in how buildings are commissioned, managed and delivered to align with global and local sustainability ambitions.

Alexander Reeve, Sustainable Building Advisor, Estates Division, University of Cambridge said: “The project is an exciting pathfinder project for the University Estate, as we refine our strategy to eliminate fossil natural gas as a fuel for our many older buildings. It demonstrates that there is a way to transition to low carbon heating while conserving Cambridge’s outstanding built heritage.”

Adapted from a CISL press release.