Campus for Research Excellence and Technological Enterprise: First Global, Green Mark Platinum, Lab of the Year Research Complex

Rachel Lee, AIA, Perkins+Will
Matthew Williamson, PE, Arup

The design team of Perkins+Will and Arup designed the Campus for Research Excellence and Technological Enterprise (CREATE) in Singapore. The project is a 730,000 sf campus with a construction budget of $335 Million USD. Singapore's National Research Foundation built CREATE to attract an international talent pool representing world class research universities, institutions and corporations. The project finished construction in December of 2012 and was recently awarded Lab of the Year 2013 by R&D Magazine.

The core values of adaptability, interaction and sustainability are CREATE's conceptual drivers. This presentation will focus primarily on three cutting-edge aspects of the project: the laboratory's significance as the first global research university; the building's sustainability features that enabled it to receive Singapore's GreenMark Platinum certification, and the highly adaptable "kit of parts" building design that allows it to evolve in order to host diverse wet and dry research programs from corporations and universities from around the world.

First Global Research University

CREATE's mission is to stimulate innovation, discovery and entrepreneurship through the interaction and collaboration of a broad spectrum of scientists and engineers. The unique CREATE community emerges from the integration of many different disciplines and cultural perspectives. The spaces for science have integrated social spaces to encourage collaboration and a free exchange of ideas.

GreenMark Platinum

Adaptability and daylight were the fundamental ordering devices at CREATE. These simple concepts informed the overall land use, site plan, building section and plan of the buildings.

For instance, two transformative strategies at CREATE were to drastically reduce the width of the buildings, allowing additional opportunities for daylighting were created by drastically reducing the width of the buildings and shifting circulation to the exterior of the building.

Given the hot-humid climate, enthalpy wheels are used to recycle energy from the exhaust stream. The research entities are served by common rooftop mechanical thus capturing first cost and operation savings. A 250kWp photovoltaic array covers the rooftop equipment generating on-site power while keeping the equipment shaded. Other sustainability measures include green roofs, green walls, chilled beams, and water reduction measures.

Kit of Parts

The flexible laboratory building is based on a consistent planning module. CREATE is based on a 3.3 meter by 3.3 meter module. This reusable plug and play kit of parts lab casework system supports the full range of lab types from computational science, wet biology, dry chemistry, as well as quality office space.

Biographies:

Rachel Lee, AIA, LEED AP focuses on complex Science + Technology projects for top-tier research institutions, applying strong managerial, lab planning, design and technical skills. Rachel's experiences encompasses, programming, laboratory planning, building planning and design, technical production, construction administration, quality assurance and project management. Rachel's projects include laboratories and research facilities for institutions including CREATE, Stanford University, University of Virginia, Buck Institute for Research on Aging, University of North Carolina, Auburn University. Her speaking engagements include SF AIA Design Award Projects and Trandelines.

Matt Williamson has 17 years combined experience in mechanical engineering and in the planning, management, design and construction of projects for both private and public clients. Matt's experience base covers projects as diverse as contamination control facilities, clean-rooms for the biotech and microelectronics industry, production facilities, infrastructure projects and research laboratories. Matt was the Project Manager and Mechanical Engineer for 140,000ft2 supercomputing center for the Department of Energy. The Computational Research and Theory Building at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory includes 30,000ft2 of computer space, two floors of offices and a level for the electrical and mechanical systems. A key feature of the project is the innovative cooling system that will accommodate the final build of a 17 MW computer system.

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