As many of you know, we have sponsored young Tom Ingram for the last two years as our own budding “Lewis Hamilton” for the future!  Tom created a remarkable reputation as a highly successful go kart driver but he has now entered Saloon car racing and had amazing success at Thruxton last weekend in front of live TV cameras, where he achieved Third place in the Ginetta Junior Championship. 

As can be seen from the photos, Tom proudly shows off the Monodraught logo and also the clothing manufacturer Joe Bloggs is one of his sponsors.  The car is also heavily branded with Monodraught logos.  We all wish Tom great success and more exposure for the Monodraught brand name in races to come.

Management Team (left to right) Leif Jensen - CEO of VKR Holding, Jackie James - Sales Director,
Tony Cull - Managing Director, Jesper Dalsgaard - Chairman, Jackie Cowling - Financial Director & PA to MD,
Professor Terry Payne, Nick Hopper - Technical Director

Tony Cull takes over as Managing Director of Monodraught Limited on 1st April.  Tony joined the company 20 years ago and has been instrumental in seeing the company’s growth go from approximately £300,000 when he joined the company to currently £15m per year turnover.  Tony has been Monodraught’s Technical Director for the last 10 years.  Terry Payne is appointed a full member of the Board of Monodraught and will continue to search for new and innovative products for the company, as well as to support the management in expanding the business into new markets. 

Monodraught already has Sales Agents in 52 countries around the world, so it will be Professor Payne’s intention to consolidate and expand these activities to promote Monodraught’s entire product range.  Leif Jensen is a board member of Monodraught and CEO of VKR Holding, the parent company of Monodraught, who has also appointed Jesper Dalsgaard as the new Chairman.  VKR employ some 15,000 employees worldwide.

Another truckload of our bespoke Windcatchers leaving our Works going off for Tesco at Dumfries! On this particular site, they had very sensitive planning issues, so in this case, they had to dispense with the trademark ‘funnel’ style for the Tesco Windcatcher. These were, however, still produced in the same special Tesco livery. Tesco themselves have made great publicity out of the Windcatcher element and on the first Eco Store at Cheetham Hill, they even have a big sign at the entrance, which says, “Our roof vents let air flow naturally, so we use less energy to heat and cool the store”. We are also pleased to say that ITN News have just completed a special filming of the site at Tesco Cheetham Hill, as part of a programme they are putting together for “Sustainability Live!”, which will be held at the NEMEX Show on 19th – 21st May. James Dorling, Head of Tesco’s Environmental Centre of Excellence, has said, “The Windcatchers are helping to reduce the energy consumption. For this reason we will be introducing Windcatchers to our larger new Stores in 2009.”

We now have the full 47-page Report from BSRIA following the very detailed testing and monitoring of the Sola-boost installed in the Reception area of their offices at Bracknell, with monitored readings taken from September of last year.  The results show not only a reduction in internal temperature, which was the main intention of the exercise but what is so encouraging is that the CO₂ reading in the Reception, which was previously in the region of 1000ppm was reduced to 508ppm, which represents a significant reduction.

The other most encouraging aspect of this installation is that the BSRIA staff generally have all expressed how pleased they are with the improved conditions provided by the Windcatcher system and particularly the indoor air quality.  A further six months’ monitoring is now to be undertaken to monitor performance from April through to October 2009 but in the meantime, the Report is available as a download for all those that may be interested.

This installation on Canterbury Court in Kennington, South London, is an excellent illustration of the versatile nature of introducing natural ventilation to individual Office Suites.  Canterbury Court is very close to the internationally famous Oval Cricket Ground and was once a Victorian Warehouse that covered a vast area.  The cost of traditional air conditioning or mechanical ventilation to such an area would have been considerable and since the design and intention of the building was that various Units were to be let off independently to one another, it was essential that each Unit had control over its natural ventilation system, hence the application of the Monodraught Windcatchers. 

The 180 year old building has in its distant past been used as accommodation for horse-driven Hackney carriages!  The Designers of the refurbishment were the Brian Warwicker Partnership and their Kevin Horsfall explained that the offices had to be naturally ventilated in order to reduce CO₂ emissions.  A total of 55N° Windcatchers units were installed and Kevin Horsfall stated that this renovation not only meets the Client, Workspace’s brief to serve as individual Units but also reflects the Brian Warwicker Partnership’s view that the best of traditional and modern technologies should be used to lower emissions and maximise comfort.

Monodraught SunPipe have been delighted to sponsor the High Wycombe Hockey Club over the last five years, Monodraught SunPipe has been particularly involved with Youth development and this has resulted in an England call up for one player.  The photograph shows Charlie Olley of High Wycombe, who has been selected for the England Under 16s squad this season.  Tony Cull, our Technical Director, has always been a strong supporter of the Hockey Club and indeed has played consistently for the Club for the last 20 years, often arriving at the office on Monday morning bashed and bruised (sometimes limping) but always with a big smile on his face, since we know he must have won his match!  The teams look extremely smart kitted out in their SunPipe T-shirts and we wish them all well for the 2009 season.

Dr Naghman Khan, who recently completed his PhD at the University of Nottingham, School of the Built Environment, has started working at Monodraught on a two year Knowledge Transfer Project with the University of Nottingham.
Monodraught’s aim for the project is to help clients successfully and with relative ease model Monodraught products in all commercial building simulation software packages such as TAS, IES, Hevacomp and SBEM.
Naghman has extensive experience in building simulation using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) and experimental wind tunnel techniques. He specialised in wind driven ventilation as part of his PhD looking particularly at complex turbulent flows around buildings and roof mounted ventilation devices.
Working closely with the software developers, Monodraught will use their experience in natural ventilation to devise an empirically sound methodology for integrating their Windcatchers and Sola-boost systems into their software packages using validated techniques to produce 'drag and drop' 3D models to be used by Architects and Consultants.