Clean Heat and Energy Efficiency central to New Canford Sixth Form Development

The new Sixth Form College development at Canford School is scheduled to open in two phases.  The College Hub for all SixthFormers will open in early 2025 and will include a Future Pathways Centre for Higher Education and Careers offering conference and seminar space for work place-style physical and virtual events and networking, a range of exciting educational and social spaces and dedicated mixed lodge space for day pupils.  Two new Upper Sixth single sex boarding wings around a central courtyard will follow in September 2026.

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Ensuring that the new buildings are energy efficient is part of the school’s ongoing commitment to utilising renewable energy sources where possible.  The College will rely predominantly on solar technology for its electricity and in addition, ground source heating is being installed.  

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As part of the preparation for this, Canford commissioned Rendesco to design a bespoke clean heating and hot water system for the new Sixth Form Development which will provide low carbon heat and hot water to pupils through a new ground source network which extracts energy from beneath the ground.

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Drilling has now been completed for sixteen sub-terranean bore holes, each drilled to a depth of 150m, drawing on heat from the ground. This will serve 120 single ensuite bedrooms for Upper Sixth boarders, as well as four adjoining staff properties.  This work has been undertaken by Rendesco, a specialist in low cost, low carbon ground source heating installation. The more stable and higher temperatures of the ground mean that ground source technology is significantly more carbon and energy efficient than alternatives, with an average carbon saving of 18 tonnes of CO₂ compared to gas boilers, and 3 tonnes of CO₂ compared to air source heat pumps.

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Tom Lloyd, Commercial Director for Rendesco, visited Canford to see the project progress:

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“I am very pleased with the development of this important element of the new College buildings for Canford School’s Sixth Form which will now benefit from a reliable and sustainable source of low carbon heating and hot water. The drilling phase has been completed successfully within the required timescales and this will now allow the build to move forwards to the next stage.

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We hope that this project, and its sustainable ambitions, inspire other projects at schools, and beyond, to adopt ground source heat technology which is by far one of the most sustainable sources of clean heat available to developers to implement across their projects..”

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Tristan Hutton, project manager at Canford School echoed this:

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“Working with Rendesco on this part of the project has been efficient and effective and their work will ensure that the new College building meets our ongoing aims to be as environmentally conscious as possible.  I thank the whole team for their efforts during challenging months of extreme wet weather in achieving delivery to keep our planned schedule for opening on track.”

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Pictured are Tom Lloyd and Tristan Hutton at the College development site at Canford School (photo credit - Canford School)

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To find out more about Canford’s Sixth Form development, please visit www.canford.com/sixth-form/new-sixth-form-college

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Press enquiries:

Canford School – Philippa Scudds marketing@canford.com

Rendesco– Edward Ingram, Pagefield Edward.ingram@pagefield.co.uk