Metallurgical Research Facility Integrates Renewables and Other Measures for a Significantly Reduced Energy Footprint
John Featherstone, AIA, OAA, RAIC, LEED AP®, Diamond Schmitt Architects
Birgit Siber, OAA, RAIC, Diamond Schmitt Architects
Natural Resources Canada chose to relocate its CANMET Materials Technology Laboratory (MTL) from Ottawa to Hamilton to be closer to the steel and manufacturing sectors it serves through metallurgical research and testing. Its new building raises the bar for sustainable design for industrial buildings in Canada, targeting LEED® Platinum as well as surpassing the 2030 Challenge.
The laboratory and office space, which spans 16,000 square meters, or 172,000 square feet, incorporates a complex industrial research program in a fully interconnected building where design and functional systems work in harmony to achieve an extremely comfortable, light-filled work environment. An integrated design process was an essential forum for determining innovative solutions that maximize the performance of the various sustainable design initiatives. These solutions included an aggressive energy intensity target of 335 kilowatt hours per square meter in order to achieve a 70 percent energy use reduction, as compared with similar facilities and geographic locations.
The design team identified site-specific conditions that were fundamental to passive strategies coupled with a high-performance thermal envelope. Orientation of the long axis on the south and north sides offers more readily harvested daylight and thermal control through orientation-specific solar shading and glazing selections and with a large roof surface to exploit solar energy sourcing.
Daylight and occupancy sensors automatically phase lighting and blinds to reduce electrical energy use. The glazing and solar shading strategy at the perimeter drives light deep into the space with the use of light transmitting glass, while customized solar shading reduces glare. These strategies, paired with daylight and occupancy sensors, reduce electrical energy requirements for lighting.
The guiding principle to the mechanical, electrical, and renewable systems is maximized energy efficiency and waste reduction. The vast roof above this three-story structure allowed for extensive renewable source installations, including 209 solar thermal collectors to harvest heat. Any excess thermal or process energy is discharged to the 152-meter-deep, 80-borehole ground source system, which is used for summer cooling.
Embedded radiant heating and cooling pipes use the thermal mass of the ceiling slabs, running at moderate temperatures in winter and summer to reduce condensation and achieve very stable interior temperatures.
The building is ventilated by a decoupled, 100 percent fresh air system delivered through access floors or low-level diffusers throughout the facility. Ventilation pre-heat is provided by a 700-square-meter, low-tech solar wall, which has shown the ability to increase incoming air by 16 degrees Celsius on a typical day in January.
Biographies:
John Featherstone is an architect registered with the AIA, Open Agent Architecture, and Royal Architectural Institute of Canada, as well as a LEED AP. Mr. Featherstone is an associate with Diamond Schmitt Architects in Toronto, where he is a specialist in research facility design and has been the firm's senior laboratory consultant since 1998. Mr. Featherstone has extensive experience in all phases of project programming, planning, and design combined with a construction management background. Mr. Featherstone's primary focus remains on research and science buildings with high sustainability ambitions. This has been a passion of Mr. Featherstone's for the past 45 years. His work at Diamond Schmitt Architects includes a diverse variety of projects, from numerous Schools of Medicine to a materials research facility designed to safely simulate radiation fields in the core of a nuclear reactor. Several of these laboratory facilities have obtained LEED Gold certification and the CANMET MTL building is currently nearing LEED Platinum certification.
Birgit Siber has practiced architecture with Diamond Schmitt Architects since 1996 and became a principal in 2003. Sustainability has been a leitmotif in Ms. Siber's work; she chairs the office sustainable design committee and actively promotes green building design within the office and the community. She is a frequent speaker at Canadian and international conferences on sustainability and recently was on a lecture circuit in Argentina and Chile. Ms. Siber is committed to the design of energy-efficient buildings and believes that the emerging design language will imbue architecture with a beauty and clarity that stems from understanding, respecting, and responding to location and climate. In the role of project architect, Ms. Siber has focused on a broad range of institutional and laboratory projects, including the University of Guelph-Humber building, which incorporates the first innovative bio-filter plant wall. Ms. Siber has recently completed work on the CANMET MTL, targeting LEED Platinum and the 2030 Challenge.