Japanese Real Estate Company Completes New Eco-Friendly Head Office with MIT

Natural ventilation systems
Copyright Hulic Co.

Hulic Co., a Japanese real estate leasing company, announced on October 1,2012, that the company and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have jointly developed and completed a new head office building for Hulic that incorporates natural ventilation and daylighting systems.

The new medium-sized, 10-story headquarters building has natural daylighting louvers (anidolic louvers) installed for offices on the fifth floor and above. The louvers, which require no mechanical power, redirect sunlight to highly reflective metal ceiling panels, in order to provide natural, gentle light evenly to office desks, irrespective of changes in time and season.

Moreover, the building has a natural ventilation system that supplies fresh air through vents above window frames on each floor, and exhausts air by two natural ventilation shafts (called solar chimneys) located on each floor. This system takes advantage of stored heat from sunlight to drive the ventilation airflow. It is not there to simply assist mechanical air-conditioning, as it heats and cools the building entirely by natural ventilation.

Energy-saving designs and initiatives for office buildings today tend to focus on high-rises and large developments, but the company says that it will continue to develop medium-sized buildings as prototypes for environment-friendly designs.