UK's ancient buildings society goes high-tech

GE Sensing & Inspecting Technologies is helping the UK’s Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings (SPAB) measure existing relative humidity and temperatures within its Spital Square headquarters to help assess the energy efficiency impact of planned building modifications.

“We can view all of the measurements taken by the system whenever we have access to the Internet,” said Mike Parrett, the consultant building pathologist and SPAB trustee. “We can quickly access environmental levels and trends within the building and/or drill down to specific measurements from specific sensors.”

“We find the alarm thresholds very useful, as an email is automatically sent to me and Mike if and when a threshold is crossed,” added project manager Matthew Slocombe. “This allows great peace of mind, as I know that any potential problem will be flagged up well before any serious damage or deterioration can occur.”

GE’s Protimeter HygroTrac System was installed in each of the building’s rooms and are programmed to transmit temperature and relative humidity readings at regular intervals to a central data acquisition gateway. The information is then accessible, at any time, to the project managers simply by logging onto a dedicated Website.

The system was installed in December 2008 and has already yielded useful data for the project team, prior to the initiation of the modification work in May 2009. The SPAB are developing advice, information and courses on improving energy efficiency, compatibly with conservation, for owners and users of ancient buildings.