A new Administrative Service Centre, established from scratch with the support of the U-LEAD with Europe Programme, will be opened in the Mykolayivska AH of the Sumy Oblast in March. The premises of the centre, built with the use of energy-efficient technologies, can be considered one of the most energy efficient administrative buildings in Ukraine.

The modern ASC will provide convenient access to high-quality services to more than 10 thousand residents of the Mykolayivska AH, and the hromada will spend at least four times less electricity for heating and ventilation than in ordinary administration buildings. According to the European energy saving classification, the ASC of the Mykolayivska AH can be referred to one of the highest classes. The administrative building with such an energy efficiency level will appear for the first time in the Ukrainian AH.

The use of the air / water heat pump, one of the most promising* and the safest engineering systems in the world market, is the core of the energy-efficient concept of the Mykolayivka ASC. The combination of this technology and floor heating provides the highest energy efficiency of the system. The recovery technology, recycling of up to 95% of the warm air and maintaining the optimum level of humidity, is used for the ASC ventilation. The room is constructed of SIP panels with additional insulation, which allowed to achieve a heat transfer resistance index of up to 50% higher than when constructed using the "brick plus insulation" method.

Vadym Lytvyn, head of the training centre of the Association of Energy Auditors of Ukraine, said: "The project design solutions provide higher energy efficiency indicators than those set out in the normative documents in force in Ukraine. Consequently, it can be attributed to one of the most effective if the work is carried out in accordance with the project."

Susanna Dellans, Project Manager of the U-LEAD with Europe Programme’s Support to Improved Administrative Service Delivery, noted: "The combination of the Swedish experience in the field of local service provision and "green technologies" implementation and enthusiasm of the hromada to implement the project creates all the conditions for emergence of the most energy efficient ASC in Ukraine, which will enable residents not only to receive high-quality and accessible administrative services, but also to save hromada’s funds".

Serhiy Danyliv, CEO of Sahara company, a partner in implementing the energy-efficient complex of the building, said: "The main feature of the project is its maximum energy efficiency and environmental friendliness. Due to the integrated system solution, we managed to achieve an indicator, when the use of energy from the environment allows you to get about 4 kW of heat from 1 kW of electricity."

The energy-efficient ASC of the Mykolayivska AH will provide more than one hundred administrative services most necessary for the hromada residents. The centre will provide 7 workplaces and employ specialists trained under a specially designed programme. The opening of the ASC is scheduled for 27 March.

It is worth reminding that 26 ASCs will be opened in Ukrainian amalgamated hromadas within the framework of the U-LEAD with Europe Programme which aims at improving the delivery of local administrative services. The best practices for creating and improving the delivery of administrative services that are tested and implemented in the pilot hromadas of the inception phase will be applied to all ASCs to be opened or modernised within the next phase of the Programme. That is at least 600 ASCs by the end of 2020.

* According to the forecasts of the European Heat Pump Association, about 60% of the world's heat demand will be provided by heat pumps by 2040.