During the refurbishment of an office building in Boulogne-Billancourt for real estate management company Perial Asset Management, the R410A refrigerant in the existing VRV system was recovered and reclaimed to provide virgin-standard refrigerant for the new VRV heat pump system.
Perial AM manages a diverse real estate portfolio mainly located in France and increasingly in Europe. The company is committed to the reduction of energy and water consumption as part of a continuous improvement process, supported by a sustainable development team comprising internal and external auditors.
Constructed in the 1990’s, the refurbished 4,200m² building comprises the ground floor and seven storeys. Following a joint study by Perial’s sustainable development team, building systems consultants BET ID Fluides, installer Semeru and Daikin, it was decided to install eight new Loop by Daikin VRV heat pump units for the ground, first and second floors.
The first step was the recovery and recycling of the R410A refrigerant from the old VRV units at Daikin’s headquarters in Nanterre, to be used for top-up charging of the new installation. The whole installation of eight new Loop by Daikin VRV heat pump units used 156kg of reclaimed refrigerant.
In addition, thermal coatings were installed on the glazing to the south-facing façade to improve summer comfort for building occupants, effectively lowering interior temperatures by 2°C, while more efficient systems lead to a 28% decrease in energy use.
To further assist with recycling objectives, viable parts from the old units have been stored on site in the underground parking area of the building. These will be reused as replacement parts for the existing units serving floors three through seven. All these actions, amongst others, led to BREEAM In-Use certification.
The Loop scheme was launched in 2019 and covers all EU member states, UK, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Serbia, Montenegro, Kosovo, Albania, North Macedonia, Iceland, Norway, Switzerland.