Kingspan OPTIM-R chosen for Royal Pavillion

The Kingspan OPTIM-R Flooring System has been fitted as part of a landmark development of luxurious apartments facing on to the new central square in the sustainable community of Poundbury.

Built on Duchy of Cornwall land, the urban extension has been developed in accordance with the architectural and urban planning principals contained within HRH The Prince of Wales’ book ‘A Vision of Britain’, creating a walkable community with a population expected to rise to 5,000 by 2025.

The Royal Pavilion sits to the north of the Queen Mother Square. Its ornate design references Greek Revival architecture and includes an iconic lantern, which forms the focal point for Leon Krier’s original masterplan. 

A Sustainable Strategy was put in place during the building’s design and a key element within this was to reduce the energy consumed through passive design solutions.

To maintain the Pavilion’s neoclassical appeal, the project team were keen to ensure these measures were as unobtrusive as possible whilst still utilising the latest technological advances.

To achieve this, the ground floor spaces have heated underflooring and to maximise the efficiency of this system the Kingspan OPTIM-R Flooring System was installed across the entire area.

Kingspan OPTIM-R rigid vacuum insulation panels (VIPs) have a declared thermal conductivity of 0.007 W/mK, outperforming some commonly used insulation materials by a factor of five.

This exceptional performance is achieved through a microporous core which is evacuated and sealed within a thin, gas-tight metal envelope and allows project U-values to be achieved with the slimmest possible insulation solution.

As within all Kingspan OPTIM-R projects, Kingspan provided a specialist design service for the application at the Royal Pavilion. The designers used the architectural floor plan to determine the optimum layout for the OPTIM-R VIPs.

Any gaps smaller than 300 mm, or areas where penetrations would be required, were filled using rigid insulation infill panels of the same thickness as the VIPs.

This planned approach provided a clear installation guideline for the installers and allowed the target U-value of 0.19 W/m2K to be met with an insulation thickness of just 20 mm, limiting the scale of ground works on the project.

The Kingspan OPTIM-R Flooring System is suitable for use with most underfloor heating systems. At the Royal Pavilion, installers laid a protective rubber crumb layer above the floor slab, followed by the Kingspan OPTIM-R Flooring System.

Fitting the insulation above the floor slab in this way allows the building to heat more quickly when the underfloor heating is turned on. An additional rubber crumb layer was then fitted above the system, followed by the underfloor heating system and floor screed.