South Australian hotel redevelopment with electrical efficiency

With ongoing commercial and residential growth in Adelaide’s inner-southwest, The Hurley Hotel Group has redeveloped the Marion Hotel to offer luxurious accommodation and improved bar and dining facilities for those living in and visiting the area.

The $20 million redevelopment includes a five level accommodation tower with 62 rooms, as well as a bigger bottle shop, new front bar and a state-of-the-art function and conference centre. The design style throughout is “quirky and industrial” and the Hurley Hotel Group, working with their long-term electrical contractor Sam Gordon of Contect Electrical, were looking for an electrical solution that would complement these aesthetics. They also needed the solution to be robust and reliable, energy efficient and easy to use.

Automation for efficiency and ease of use

With the hotel dramatically expanded, the size of the incoming electrical supply line was also increased. The new supply line is almost three times the demand as previous, and Sam has installed a new main switchboard, 12 custom distribution boards and generator power facilities. Each board features metering of mechanical, power and light circuits. This data is then collected by Schneider Electric’s Com’X Energy Management Software and reported through to EcoStruxure Facility Expert. This powerful cloud-based software keeps track of equipment to ensure ongoing reliability and faster troubleshooting in the event of an equipment fault. The monitoring solution will be used by The Hurley Hotel Group to keep track of their energy use and over time to make efficiencies which can be replicated at other hotels in the group’s portfolio.

Using the new Clipsal by Schneider Electric C-Bus Network Automation Controller, two C-Bus networks have been installed at the hotel — one in the accommodation tower, and the other in the bars and dining area. In the accommodation hallways C-Bus scenes alter lighting levels depending on the time of day. Similarly, different lighting scenes have been programmed in the bar and dining areas to create different moods depending on the time of day. Newly released Clipsal Iconic C-Bus switches and Clipsal eDLT switches allow hotel staff to manually alter the lights.

The Marion Hotel function area boasts the perfect space for weddings, conferences and get-togethers. To be suitable for this range of activities, the space can be transformed from one large space into several smaller ones. For this reason, a Clipsal DALI lighting solution, which can also be used either as one large bank of lights, or as separate ‘rooms’, has been installed to control lights and AV equipment.

Clipsal Iconic Anthracite and Iconic Styl Silver Shadow switches and sockets have been used throughout the project, with the range picked by the group for its fresh and edgy look.

“The Hurley Hotel Group is known for keeping things fresh and up to date, so the ability for them to safely and easily change the skins on the Iconic switches and sockets is something I expected they will take advantage of in the years to come,” Sam said.

For their part, Contect were involved in the project for around 18 months. They chose Schneider Electric and Clipsal by Schneider Electric products and solutions for the project because of the quality and support that comes with them.

“I have been using Clipsal and Schneider Electric products for well over 20 years. It is a brand I can trust,” Sam said. “Schneider Electric is very supportive of their product. If we encounter something difficult, we can call them and they send someone down to help us out. They have some great solutions and ideas which always help us out. You really wouldn’t go with anyone else.”

For more information on Schneider Electric’s hotel solutions, visit se.com/au/hotels