Vent-Axia Supports High-Quality Student Living at Olympian’s Alfreton Road PBSA Development in Nottingham

  Posted by: electime      9th June 2026

Vent-Axia has delivered high-performance ventilation across Centre Court, Olympian’s landmark purpose-built student accommodation (PBSA) development on Alfreton Road, Nottingham. Built on the former Forest Mill site, which had stood derelict for over a decade, the scheme comprises 790 student beds alongside 19 affordable homes, supporting the regeneration of the area and meeting increasing demand for quality student accommodation. The £120m scheme is just a 13-minute walk from the Nottingham Trent University campus.

The development consists of three buildings: The Alfreton Building, The Spine Building and The High Hurst Building. The development was completed in September 2025 with the first residents moving in for the new academic year.

The scheme is the first student accommodation in the UK to feature an outdoor padel court. It also includes a Café & Co-Working Space, Study Space, Games Area, Private Dining, Gym, Yoga Studio, Cinema Room, Gaming Booth and a Garden Terrace. Vent-Axia worked closely with the project team to supply a range of energy-efficient ventilation solutions designed to deliver excellent indoor air quality (IAQ) while supporting modern airtight construction standards. Mechanical Ventilation with Heat Recovery (MVHR) units were installed across the development, including Vent-Axia’s Lo-Carbon Sentinel Econiq Cool-Flow, Sentinel Kinetic Cooker Hood, Sentinel Kinetic Plus, and Sentinel Kinetic High Flow units. Together, these solutions provide effective ventilation, helping to create healthy, comfortable living environments for residents while meeting energy efficiency targets.

The Olympian project was delivered in under two years by construction partner RG Group, supported by a dedicated supply chain. The wider team included Hodders as architect, PUMA Capital and Housing Growth Partnership as funding partners, Bond Bryan for interiors, Educated Body as gym designers, Meridian Consult as building control, Vitec as MEP consultant, Goddard Consulting as principal designer, and C&D Electrical as M&E Contractors.

Ashley Beresford, Commercial Director, C&D Electrical, said: “We have worked with Vent-Axia for a number of years and chose Vent-Axia for this project since they not only provide an extensive range of high-quality, reliable products but also work closely with our design team to resolve technical challenges and optimise performance.

Today’s developments demand flexibility, there is no longer a one-size-fits-all approach to ventilation. Regulation is driving this shift, meaning we need a range of adaptable solutions to meet project-specific requirements. We specified the Lo-Carbon Sentinel Econiq Cool-Flow since it combines all the benefits of MVHR with an integrated DX cooling module helping prevent overheating and meet the requirements of Part O. Overheating, in particular, is becoming a critical issue in modern student accommodation, and effective ventilation plays a key role in addressing it.”

Centre Court is now managed by Homes for Students, offering residents high-quality accommodation designed around comfort, wellbeing and performance. The development demonstrates how carefully specified ventilation solutions can play a key role in raising standards across the PBSA sector.

The range of MVHR units used meet the varying demands of the project. With thermal comfort a key issue in thermally efficient airtight modern buildings, Vent-Axia’s groundbreaking Lo-Carbon Sentinel Econiq Cool-Flow is an MVHR combined with its intelligent Econiq Cool-Flow Module, designed to address overheating in new homes. As global temperatures rise and homes become more airtight to reduce carbon emissions, the Lo-Carbon Sentinel Econiq Cool-Flow offers an innovative solution for developers to mitigate overheating and improve IAQ.

Boasting an Energy Efficiency Ratio (EER) up to 4.12, with best-in-class Specific Fan Powers (SFPs) and thermal efficiencies up to 93% the Lo-Carbon Sentinel Econiq Cool-Flow features intelligent controls that automatically switch between heat recovery, summer bypass, and active cooling (via the intelligent Econiq Cool-Flow Module), continuously measuring internal/external temperatures to maintain comfort thresholds efficiently.

Meanwhile, the Lo-Carbon Sentinel Kinetic Cooker Hood combines a cooker hood with mechanical ventilation with heat recovery (MVHR) unit in one. The unit works seamlessly as an MVHR unit delivering energy efficient ventilation, providing healthy filtered air, supplying and extracting air continuously, recovering heat that would be otherwise lost. Then when the cooker hood is needed, it is simply pulled out to provide a purge of cooker fumes.

Ideal for student accommodation the unit is designed to fit in a 600mm wide aperture above a hob, fitting inside a kitchen unit for a seamless finish. The telescopic hood is pulled out when required and this triggers the MVHR unit to switch to a pre-defined boost speed and the summer bypass automatically opens to prevent cooking by-products entering the heat recovery cell. The hood incorporates removable metal grease filters; low energy lamps to illuminate the hob top; and is available with a white or brushed aluminium front trim.

Low carbon, energy saving and clean, Sentinel Kinetic High Flow MVHR is ideal for larger homes and offers a whole building heat recovery system combining supply and extract ventilation in one unit. Warm, moist air is extracted from ‘wet’ rooms through ducting and passed through the heat exchanger before being exhausted outside and fresh incoming air is preheated via the integral heat exchanger. The unit can extract from up to fourteen wet rooms and a communal kitchen while still achieving almost 90% heat recovery. It has four fully adjustable speeds and a purge setting and its energy saving Vent-Axia DC motors further improves efficiency and carbon reductions.

For further information on Vent-Axia’s full range of ventilation solutions for residential and student accommodation projects, telephone +44 (0)344 856 0590 or visit www.vent-axia.com.