| Solar Water Heating for StayEasy Emalahleni Hotel |
| Written by Stephen Forder |
| Monday, 31 August 2009 07:36 |
|
Guests at the new Southern Sun StayEasy Emalahleni Hotel in Witbank would be hard pressed to discern that their piping hot water was not heated by electricity from the nearby coal fired power plant. Instead, the hot water requirement for the hotel is provided in large part by a 6 000 litre solar hot water system. This supplements an additional 6 000 litre heat pump system. Gavin Pereira of G K Pereira Consulting cc, the company that designed the reticulation for the installation, describes the heat pump system as a good option of “topping up” the 60 degree celsius hot water system when no solar contribution is available. According to Dylan Tudor-Jones from Solar Heat Exchangers who designed and installed the solar hot water system, the solar components have reduced the peak electrical load needed for the provision of hot water by 70kVA. Roof space was a limiting factor in that no more than 40 solar collectors could be installed. This limited the capacity of the solar component of the system to 6 000 litres. Click on the thumbnails below to enlarge them
Mark Boyd, Development Director for Southern Sun, said that the company will always incorporate green features into its hotels going forward. He added that other green features that have been implemented at the hotel include the use of extremely low energy lights in the form of light emitting diodes (LEDs) in areas like passages where lighting is a requirement 24/7, presence detection lighting in back of house areas, automatic shut-off of lights and air-conditioning in empty rooms, elements of energy efficient building design in new and retrofitted buildings, heat recovery systems and grey water re-use. According to Boyd, in the hospitality industry roughly 40% of the total energy consumption of an operation is attributed to water heating. Solar water heating can save approximately 40% of this amount translating to enormous gains in terms of cost savings with obvious environmental benefits. The 70kVA saving at the StayEasy Emalahleni Hotel at peak water heating times would translate into the prevention of the emission of 70kg of CO2 an hour. Sarah Mohapi, Deputy General Manager of the StayEasy Emalahleni Hotel says that guests are advised verbally on check-in of the solar hot water system and other green features of the hotel and printed material is placed in each room elaborating on the measures. “Guests respond very positively to the green features of the hotel” says Mohapi. |
