Modern Building Services

MODERN BUILDING SERVICES JULY 2022 13 FEATURE WORKING BUILDINGS ƒMAINTENANCE, OPERATIONAND REFURBISHMENT Furthermore, the use of a temporary boiler and plant room can safely allow existing plant rooms and boilers to be worked on offline. This allows the old plant to be safely cooled and avoids anyone having to work on a live system which is innately dangerous. Working on any live system is dangerous; it is safer to work in a plant room that is cold and has its power isolated because otherwise, one error can have fatal consequences. Of course, strict safety measures are put in place but you can never account for human error so there is always a residual risk. By using a temporary boiler, you can eliminate that risk. If something were to go wrong whilst working on a live system a hospital or school could be forced to close. When a primary school in Dartford, Kent needed a temporary boiler whilst their plant room was being replaced, Ideal Heat Solutions was able to set up and install a temporary boiler within half a day. This was a planned project because the school had organised contractors to replace its plant room. They required a temporary boiler to provide heating for just over two months and during the school Christmas holidays until the work to the plant room was finished. We identified a safe location to site the boiler to ensure the safety of children and staff on site. We provided a 250kW oil-fired containerised boiler, 3000ltr fuel tank, 30m x 50mm HTG hose. We were able to set up and install the temporary boiler within half a day to ensure minimum disruption to the school. The client had used us before so they knew they could trust our expert team of engineers to work quickly and safely to provide them with a solution. Temporary boilers can also be monitored remotely to ensure they perform as expected. In recent years and with the advent of technology, remote monitoring has become a possibility. This means that control centres can keep an eye on a temporary boiler’s efficiency and performance. Remote monitoring technology continuously sends data and reports on how a plant is doing. It also alerts engineers of any issues affecting a temporary heating system, where engineers can have full control over the temporary plant at the click of a button. Good design is key Plant rooms don’t generate any value, so architects are often encouraged to design plant rooms to be as small as possible. On sites where there has been a great deal of redevelopment, plant rooms can often be hard to gain access to. Plant rooms can often be built in inaccessible places including roofs which means contractors sometimes have to use a crane to access a plant room and remove an old boiler. If a building has had a retrofit, it can mean the plant room is extremely tight. This could mean it is necessary to take a plant room offline to replace a boiler. To break down a boiler and rebuild it in a plant room is a hugely expensive operation and many manufacturers will not even allow this. There is often not enough allowance made to get equipment out whilst leaving everything else in situ. As a result, plant replacement becomes extremely difficult from an operational perspective. This means that sites are often forced to limp along with appliances leaking water and fumes because it is known that replacement is going to be complicated and potentially time-consuming. By taking a plant offline and using temporary solutions people can save time and money in the long run. On a large site where there may be underground pipework which can be difficult to get to, we are able to break down the loads to take the site on and offline, helping to maintain the system and avoid having to turn off large parts of the network. This allows people to keep their buildings running, which for some sectors like healthcare could be critical. In summary, it is important now more than ever to ensure that plant is running safely and effectively, so that buildings perform as intended for the benefit of occupants. It certainly pays to be proactive rather than reactive under these circumstances. With a planned maintenance schedule in place, risk and extra costs can be kept at bay. More information can be found at www.idealheatsolutions.co.uk