Solar School – St George’s School, Wallasey

St George
On Leasowe Road is the first building in the world to be heated entirely by solar energy. At 53.4°N, it is also the most northerly. The “Solar Campus” was formerly St George’s Secondary School and was built in 1961 to the designs of Emslie Morgan, the Assistant Borough Architect, who spent a lifetime looking into ways of harnessing the sun’s rays. His research resulted in a matchbox like building with, on one side a drab, windowless façade and on the other 10,000 square feet (1,000 m2) of glass, a giant solar wall.

The wall is built of glass leaves two feet apart. These draw the ultra violet rays from sunshine and bounce them around the walls of the classrooms. The walls become warm and heat the air. Hardly any warmth escapes through the school’s massively thick roof and walls covered with slabs of plastic foam. On the coldest days it is always 60 degrees Fahrenheit inside, and in summer the school is cooler than its more conventional neighbours, for panels inside the glass wall can be turned to deflect heat or absorb it – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leasowe#Solar_School