Week 9 Internship Blog - Peddle Thorp and SBE
Week 9 Completed – 2 Weeks to Go at Peddle Thorp Architects and Sustainable Built Environments!
This week, I continued work on an ongoing Environmentally Sustainable Design (ESD) Report for a residential property in Sandringham. My primary task was to update the existing report due to recent design changes.
I began by reviewing the latest architectural drawings particularly the floor plans to identify any modifications made since the last submission. Once the design changes were documented, I conducted a Water Sensitive Urban Design (WSUD) Stormwater Management assessment.
WSUD is a fundamental aspect of sustainable building design and a standard requirement across many local councils. The WSUD framework incorporates compliance with both the STORM and MUSIC modelling tools, in alignment with CSIRO best-practice guidelines for urban stormwater treatment.
The STORM calculator is used to model straightforward solutions where multiple stormwater treatment systems operate in parallel. In contrast, MUSIC modelling provides more detailed analysis of biofiltration systems and enables comparison between proprietary treatment solutions. For this project, I used the STORM calculator to evaluate stormwater runoff and achieve a compliance score of at least 100%, ensuring the proposed design meets minimum performance benchmarks. These results inform opportunities for improvement, which I will relay back to the architectural team.
Next, I updated the Built Environment Sustainability Scorecard (BESS) to reflect changes in the project’s sustainability performance particularly those related to stormwater management. The BESS tool is used in planning applications to assess the environmental sustainability of new developments. The updated scores now better reflect the proposed ESD enhancements and their positive impact on rainwater runoff reduction.
The ESD report is still in progress, pending additional information and modelling results. I look forward to finalising this report next week and contributing further to a range of planning and sustainability projects.