Seamab School, Kinross-shire

Seamab is a charity that provides residential care and education for children and young people across Scotland, and their new state-of-the-art school will help to provide an improved learning environment for pupils.

The old school building is costly to maintain with cramped classrooms and dark, narrow corridors. The new school has been designed to be more eco-friendly, light and airy, with easy movement between areas. It includes a multipurpose recreational space, and 6 classrooms.

Flex7 lighting controls were networked with occupancy across all corridors, so that lights will come on and stay on while any of the corridors are in use, turning off when presence is no longer detected in any area. This provides a safe and welcoming environment for pupils at all times.

Classrooms in the new building are all open ceilinged, meaning that the lighting connection and control system can not be hidden behind ceiling tiles. To get around this problem Dual Control Lighting Distribution Boxes are being installed in connected WCs (which do have a suspended ceiling) to discreetly share power between the 2 areas. This type of Lighting Distribution Box can be used share power, but control 2 groups/circuits of luminaires independently of each other, doing away with the need for multiple Boxes.

Classrooms, staff rooms and offices were fitted with energy-saving daylight linking controls, which adjust lights up or down depending on the amount of natural light in the room. Absence control was chosen over occupancy control. This gives users an extra level of control over lighting, allowing them to decide if lights need to be turned on, or whether they’re happy with ambient light in an area. Lights will still turn off automatically once an area is vacated, ensuring energy is not wasted lighting unoccupied areas.