THEMIS BUILDING

One of the pioneers of sustainable service sector property.

One of France’s pioneering low-carbon office buildings, Thémis is a 10,500 m² office complex designed by Vezzoni et associés and delivered in 2018 by Icade Promotion.

Artelia has been resolutely committed to implementing the exemplary environmental approach of this project, which has resulted in high-level certifications and methodological progress in the assessment of indoor air quality.

CONTEXT & ISSUES

Located in the Clichy-Batignolles development area, one of the urban renewal zones of Greater Paris, Thémis is an office building designed by its architects and developers as a benchmark for sustainable building. It places great emphasis on wood, with its mixed wood-concrete structure and CLT floors, and on plants, with its green roof and 260 climbing plants on the south-facing facade. It relies on geothermal energy for its heating needs. It also benefits from a double-skin glass envelope that improves the thermal and acoustic insulation of its north facade, overlooking the ring road, and allows plenty of natural light into the building.

Artelia led the implementation of this ambitious environmental approach, analysing the building’s life cycle and construction materials, working on interior comfort and greening, and optimising its management of energy, water and waste. As a result, Thémis has obtained high-level environmental certifications: HQE (high environmental quality) Exceptional, BREEAM Excellent, Effinergie+ (2012 benchmark) and Biosourcé (2015 benchmark). The project was also one of the first in the Paris Region to be awarded the E+C- (positive energy and carbon reduction, E2C2 level) label, and one of the first 10 projects to be awarded the BBCA (low carbon building) label, playing a pioneering role in the development of this label.

Our teams also involved Thémis in the work they were doing at the time with the CSTB ( Scientific and Technical Centre for Building) on indoor air quality. Measurements taken in this building contributed to the development of MATHIS-QAI, a tool designed to calculate indoor concentrations of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and aldehydes, whether emitted by building materials or from the outside environment. These subjects were the basis of a thesis supervised by Artelia.