School Swimming Pools and the Education Estates Strategy

The Government’s Education Estates Strategy, published this year, sets out a decade-long commitment to renewing the school building stock across England. It is the most significant statement of intent on education infrastructure in over fifteen years, and for those of us working in building services, it contains a clear signal that ventilation and air quality are central to the strategy’s ambitions.

At Recotherm, we have been designing and manufacturing swimming pool ventilation and dehumidification systems for over forty years. In that time, we have worked on pools in schools, leisure centres, hotels and healthcare facilities across the UK. What the Education Estates Strategy describes – ageing building fabric, overheating, poor indoor air quality and the need to plan strategically rather than react to failure – is something we recognise immediately. It is the story of the school swimming pool estate.

In this article we set out what the strategy means in practice for school swimming pools and why M&E consultants and estate managers should be making ventilation renewal part of their capital planning conversations now.

When pool ventilation underperforms three things happen in parallel.

First, trichloramines, the chloramine compounds produced by the reaction of chlorine with organic matter in pool water, accumulate in the air above the water surface. These compounds are the primary cause of the characteristic ‘chlorine smell’ that many associate with indoor pools, but as we’ve discussed before, they are more than an irritant. There is an established body of research linking prolonged trichloramine exposure to airway inflammation and they are a recognised occupational health concern for pool workers and regular swimmers.

Second, moisture levels rise. Indoor pools are high-humidity environments by design and the ventilation system is the primary mechanism for managing that humidity. When it fails or degrades, condensation forms on structural surfaces like walls, roof structures and ductwork. The long-term effect of condensation on building fabric can be severe: corrosion, timber decay and structural deterioration that is costly to remediate and, if left unaddressed, can render a pool inoperable.

Third, energy consumption increases. A system that is no longer operating at its design parameters will typically be compensating through increased run hours or higher energy draw. The pool carries on, but at a significantly higher operational cost than necessary and with a carbon footprint to match.

When we are called in to assess a school pool ventilation system, the conversation often starts with a discussion about repair. A component has failed, a control system is playing up, performance has dropped. Given school budgets are finite, the instinct is to fix what’s broken and extend the asset life.

In some cases, that is the right answer, but in many it’s not. A system installed in the 1980s or ’90s that has been running continuously in a high-humidity, chemically aggressive environment is not the same system it was at commissioning. Efficiency will have declined, components corroded and the control logic, if it exists at all, will bear no resemblance to modern demand-controlled ventilation.

The whole-life cost argument for replacement is well established in building services, but it is particularly compelling for pool ventilation. Consider what a modern system delivers that an older one typically does not:

• Heat recovery through a high-efficiency recuperator, reducing the energy required to condition incoming fresh air
• Demand-controlled ventilation (DCV), adjusting air volumes in response to actual pool usage and air quality rather than running at fixed rates regardless of occupancy
• Variable speed drives (VSDs) and EC motors, reducing electrical consumption compared to fixed-speed plant
• Integrated controls compatible with BEMS, enabling remote monitoring, fault detection and optimisation from a central platform
• Accurate pressure relationship management between pool hall and adjacent spaces, preventing moisture-laden air from migrating into the building structure

Together these features reduce energy consumption and actively protect the building. Condensation damage, structural corrosion and premature fabric deterioration are all symptoms of ventilation systems that are no longer doing their job. Addressing the ventilation system is, in many cases, the most effective intervention available to extend the life of the pool building itself.

For M&E consultants or pool contractors working with school clients, the Education Estates Strategy creates a genuine opportunity to have that conversation with estates teams and business managers. The funding is there, the policy intent is clear and the technical case for ventilation renewal is compelling. The challenge is connecting the capital planning process with the specification process early enough for the right system to be selected.

Pool ventilation is a specialist discipline. The interaction between water chemistry, air quality, pressure relationships, heat recovery and structural protection requires a level of technical depth that general-purpose ventilation design does not always provide. Getting the specification right at the outset is significantly cheaper than correcting it after installation.

Any specification conversation for pool ventilation and dehumidification in 2026 also needs to address the F-gas transition. The phase-down of high-GWP refrigerants under the F-gas Regulation is already affecting equipment availability and service costs for older systems. Systems using R407C or R410A refrigerants will face increasing pressure on parts supply and engineer availability in the years ahead.

For new installations, specifiers should be evaluating low-GWP alternatives and, where the application permits, refrigerant-free heat recovery systems. At Recotherm, Aerum, our boiler-free renewable heating unit with low-GWP sits alongside our range of refrigerant-free units including Artis and Aeris.

Recotherm offers a CIBSE-approved CPD on indoor swimming pool ventilation. Click below to register for our next session or to discuss a specific project, contact us at enquiries@recotherm.co.uk.