On the 5th of February, sixteen Mollier members were able to visit the laboratories of Peutz in Molenhoek, which is located in the most northern part of Limburg. When we arrived, Peutz had prepared a very nice lunch for us. After the lunch we were introduced to the company.

Casper Esmeijer, the director of Peutz, started the presentation by welcoming us and he explained a little bit about what Peutz does. Tim Weekenstroo continued the presentation and showed us some interesting projects they were working on, like the new railroad bridge across the A1, were they advised in the acoustical optimization of the bridge. Manon Derks, old treasurer and commissioner education of the 18th board of Mollier, talked about her daily activities at Peutz. Manon started working at Peutz just before our company visit of last year, and now works at Peutz for almost a year.

After the presentations, we were divided in two groups. One group was guided by Tim and the other group by Manon. We saw the rooms for acoustical measurements, were sound experiments are conducted. One of the rooms was an anechoic chamber, which means there is almost no reflection of sound. This was quite a strange experience. We also visited a storage room of enormous 1:10 scale models of some imposing theaters. These were used for acoustical experiments. We were also able to see the climate rooms, were experiments are conducted under extremely precise conditions.

We also visited the wind tunnel and even had the possibility to go inside. A lot of us were surprised by the enormous size of the space behind the actual test area. The picture below was taken in front of the fans of the wind tunnel, which shows how large it is.

Unfortunately, we were not able to visit the fire laboratory due to an experiment that was in process. However, we saw some videos of experiments during the presentation so we still had a good idea of what Peutz does in the field of fire safety.

We would like to thank Peutz for making the company visit possible and showing us the interesting facilities they have.

On Monday February 5th, Mollier will go to Molenhoek to visit Peutz. More information about this excursion can be found here.

Last Thursday, fifteen Mollier members went on an excursion to the Hermitage in Amsterdam. After spending some time in traffic, we arrived at the Hermitage. With some coffee, tea and cookies we got a warm welcome by Wouter Flach of Kuijpers in one of the presentation rooms.

Sebastiaan Lagendaal, head of Facilities and Safety at the Hermitage, told us about the project “Tussen Kunst en Kas”, meaning “between art and greenhouse”. In this project, they connected the Hermitage to the Hortus Botanicus. He explained us that an ATES was installed in the Hermitage. This is an Aquifer Thermal Energy Storage and it is used to store energy underground in the form of warm or cold water. However the ATES installation of the Hermitage had a heat surplus. For this, a solution had to be found, which came from the botanical garden Hortus Botanicus. The greenhouses of the botanical garden require a lot of heat and the used installations were pretty old and needed renovation. It took some time and a lot of effort, but eventually 450 meter long pipes were placed between the two sites. The heat surplus of the Hermitage is now being transported at 16-17 degrees Celsius to the Hortus, where the temperature is being raised by a heat pump to 55 degrees Celsius. The resulting cool water from the Hortus is being returned to the Hermitage to cool the exhibition halls. This way both sites profit of the arrangement.

After hearing the process of making this all possible, we got a tour around the project. First we walked through the attic of the Hermitage and could see the ducts of the exhibition rooms towards the installation room, where the real art happens. As it takes some time for an ATES system to run fully optimized, we could see that they were still busy adjusting the systems to make sure it is as energy efficient as possible. We then walked towards the Hortus, following the same route as the pipes that connected both sites. Here we could the see the installation used for heating the water and delivering it to the greenhouses, together with the back-up heating system. Back at the Hermitage we had a delicious lunch, after which everyone could go their own way.

We would like to thank Kuijpers and the Hermitage for showing us this interesting and daring project.

In collaboration with Kuijpers, Mollier is organizing an excursion to Amsterdam on the 7th of December. We will visit the Hermitage and the Hortus, two buildings that are connected by a thermal storage system. The Hermitage was renovated by Kuijpers in 2009. The building needed more cooling than heating, so the excess heat is deployed in the Hortus, a botanical garden that needs a lot of heat to maintain the subtropical climate. Because of the 400 meter distance between these two buildings, this is a very interesting project. The control system is extraordinary as well, because the two climates are so different from each other but they are both controlled by the same system.

For more information about the program and to sign up, visit this page.