Sustainable workconditions

The residents

The Atlas building is the home to the Industrial Design (ID) and Industrial Engineering & Innovation Sciences (IE&IS) departments, central lecture auditoria, flexible study areas, laboratories and study associations as well as the auxiliary services of TU/e, the Executive Board, the ESoE, the Strategic Areas, Innovation Lab, Fundraising, the staff of the Bachelor College and the Graduate School along with the University Club. The building also has a restaurant, cycle shed and exhibition areas. 

The benefits for the residents

A sustainable building is a healthy building where the users can work pleasantly and comfortably, so the design has taken account of aspects like thermal comfort, view, daylight perception, air quality and acoustic comfort. This feeling of comfort is enhanced by the users being able to open the windows themselves, manually adjust the sun blinds as well as operate the climate and light controls.

The use of room-high glass creates a significant degree of incoming daylight. Around 85% of the teaching rooms have a daylight factor of at least 2%; in rooms that have an office function, this is as high as 95%. More than 50% of the rooms use for conferences have a daylight factor exceeding 2%. 

Influence the climate and light

Climate ceilings in the rooms heat and cool the rooms on a radiation basis, using water as the means of transporting energy (most energy-efficient way). This feels very comfortable. In double-height rooms where many people converge and which require a lot of air, the climate control has been effected by cooled and heated air. The ventilation is on the basis of CO2 and dependent on the occupancy of the room.

The building management system has been linked to a smartphone application that makes users aware in an interactive way of the effect of their behavior on the energy consumption and may influence their level of comfort. With an app they can individual, if they wish, change the light and climate.

The prominently located Red Stair encourages interaction, meeting and movement. This fosters the health of the users and limits the use of energy by elevators