MOTO, Wetherby

Client: MOTO
Type of works: supply and installation of Dyson Airblade™ hand dryers.

There are 45 MOTO service areas across the country, employing over 6,000 people. In August 2008 at Wetherby on the A1, MOTO opened the first carbon neutral service area in the country using only energy-efficient technology like automatic lights, ground source heat recovery and natural ventilation. The washrooms didn’t escape scrutiny either – Dyson Airblade™ hand dryers were installed because they use less energy and can help reduce a building’s carbon footprint.

New motorway service areas aren’t built often – constructing slip roads disrupts traffic and planning is often complicated. In the six years since MOTO developed their last service area, a lot has changed – developers are now required to keep carbon footprints as low as possible. MOTO decided their latest project would be different – the UK’s first carbon neutral service area and their Company Services Manager, Steve Hill was looking for energy saving solutions for this project.

“Wherever possible we used energy saving or low-carbon products,” explains Steve. “Installing alternatives to things we take for granted, like heating and cooling the building, proved a real challenge.”

The Wetherby station decided to combine natural ventilation and ground source heat recovery systems, which allow the building to use energy from the sun, wind and ground – this required complex orientation of the building and drilling at depth. The end result is a comfortable building for all its customers. When it came to the washrooms, Steve and his team had less of a problem.

“Finding an alternative hand dryer that uses less energy was pretty simple – we’ve already got a hundred or more Dyson Airblade™ hand dryers in some of our other service areas, so we knew they’d be suitable for a carbon neutral building,” explains Steve.

“We’ve used Dyson Airblade™ hand dryers for the last two years. And I’ve not heard a bad comment yet. They use much less energy than warm air dryers – there’s even a model that’s less carbon-intensive to manufacture.”