As energy prices are skyrocketing around the world, proposed alterations and extensions to Consulate General of Republic of Serbia in Sydney, Australia, will be generating all the power it needs for its operation.

Serbian Diplomatic-Consular facility is situated in Sydney’s heritage suburb of Woollahra. Buildings in the complex have seen better days. They were last restored almost fifty years ago when the Consulate was providing services to the much larger diaspora of former Yugoslavia. Only recently, a settlement among the former Yugoslav states has awarded this complex to the Republic of Serbia.

Half a century of deterioration has called for urgent works on the complex. At the same time reduced staffing needs and an excess of space has fostered the idea to transform a portion of office space into a residence for the Consul General and extend residential quarters to accommodate other consulate employees.

The tender for preparation of design and documentation for this project was won by local architectural and planning practice DESIM; run by Tatjana Djuric-Simovic and Dejan Simovic; alumni of the Architecture Faculty, Belgrade University.

DESIM has sustainability at the heart of its activities, which led to decision that proposed alterations and extensions be completed with minimum impact on environment.

This was achieved by implementing principles of Circular Economy – designing out waste and extend use of existing elements, while re-using as much as possible. The only parts of the existing facilities proposed for demolition are two garages, materials from which will be used in restoration of remaining parts of the complex.

Utilising Dejan’s expertise as a certified Passive House Designer, all parts of the building, existing and newly built, are designed to high performance Passive House standard. That would mean that heating and cooling demand will be reduced by maximizing use (and reuse) of energy generated and acquired by the building itself. Overall energy consumption would be reduced to less than 25% of its “business as usual” expected use. That 25% is proposed to be generated by PV solar panels on building’s roofs, therefore making this diplomatic complex independent of the local energy grid.

Passive House standard will be achieved partly due to the solid build of the original building that requires relatively small amounts of additional insulation, and has relatively small glazing areas.

In spiration for proposed extension are Sydney’s classic “terrace houses” with compact volume and utilization of common walls. New external walls are proposed to be of structural insulated panels (SIP) while internal structural walls are of cross laminated timber (CLT) panels. The horizontal structure will also be composed of SIP panels.

Additional external staircases to residential parts are inspired by Serbian national architecture and its element of “doksat”.

Of course, all appliances will be electrical, including hot water heat pumps. Even the parking area will be equipped with chargers for electric vehicles.

Apart from saving on energy and reducing the CO2 footprint, the additional benefit of Passive house design is a healthy internal environment – constant optimum air quality and comfort, uninterrupted supply of filtered fresh air, and noise reduction in working and living interiors in an otherwise noisy city locale. Filtered air supply that replaces complete internal air volume every three hours has the additional benefit of filtering out smoke from bushfires as can often affect Sydney.

Although it is a relatively small project, less than 1000m2, combination of different uses, as well as a need for renovation, partial change of use of existing facilities and construction of additional residential units has added to complexity of the project. Passive House principles also involve additional design detailing and quality control through independent certification; during design as well as construction phases. At the end of the project, air-tightness performance is tested in order for project to achieve full certification.

Approval for the project has been obtained form the local council earlier this year in surprisingly short time, without many objections. However, the COVID pandemic has delayed the process of tendering for contractors to execute this project.

While this is probably the first diplomatic mission in Australia that is designed to Passive House standard, other countries, like Belgium, are building all their government buildings to this standard, which includes embassies in Congo and Morocco.