$105M Sustainable UCSD Research Building Tops Out

SAN DIEGO-Those who follow @GlobeStcom on Twitter and @GlobeStLIVE may have seen a post teasing the announcement, but GlobeSt.com has learned that McCarthy Building Cos. Inc. has topped out on the new Health Sciences Biomedical Research Facility at the University of California, San Diego in La Jolla. ZGF Architects LLP is the project architect.

As GlobeSt.com previously reported, construction on the $105-million 196,000-square-foot facility began in May 2011. The development is part of an ongoing expansion at the UC San Diego School of Medicine.

Located on a 3.3-acre site within the UCSD School of Medicine campus, the Heath Sciences Biomedical Research Facility is being built to achieve LEED Platinum Certification, and potentially could receive notoriety as being the highest performing laboratory facility in the entire country, according to a prepared statement. McCarthy construction crews recently completed the last concrete pour on the five-story building. Final project completion is scheduled for August 2013.

Boone Hellmann, campus architect for UCSD, heads the facilities design and construction office charged with implementing the $105 million project, with James Gillie, senior director of construction services for UCSD, supervising construction and Mark Rowland charged with overall project management, according to a prepared statement. “We’re on track to make this project the most sustainably designed research lab on the UCSD campus and possibly in the entire nation,” Hellmann says. “The McCarthy/ZGF project team has been working closely with us to tailor a project delivery system that will help ensure the success of our mission.”

The new research laboratory will have a function similar to the existing 145,000-square-foot UCSD School of Medicine Leichtag Family Foundation for Biomedical Research Building, which McCarthy completed in spring 2004. The research building will fit within the modern design context of the academic mall on the School of Medicine campus, with its exterior incorporating a combination of concrete, curtain wall, metal panels, and terra cotta cladding, according to a prepared statement. The facility will encompass wet labs, open lab space, lab support, and administrative support space on five stories above ground, with core lab space and support mechanical, electrical and plumbing systems located in the basement.        

According to the statement, distinctive design features of the building include “dynamic, computer-controlled exterior solar shading systems on the east, west and south facades, representing the most extensive use of this type of shading by any building in the UC system.” UCSD will study how capturing natural light in this manner lends itself to enhancing students’ learning abilities and study motivation, says the release.

In addition, in response to San Diego County’s water shortage, the building’s design also dictates extensive reuse of water for landscape irrigation, as well as urinal and toilet flushing. Particular attention also will be given to the build-out of the mechanical, electrical and plumbing systems to ensure optimum energy efficiency. “We've collaborated with McCarthy on past UC-system projects,” explains Joe Collins, a partner with ZGF and principal architect for the new UCSD education laboratory. “For this particular facility, the team has gone a step beyond by bringing subcontractors aboard during the initial design phases to help us fashion a seamless, integrated building process.”

Bob Betz, senior vice president for McCarthy, says that one of the most technically challenging aspects of construction will be the lab space and highly MEP-intensive areas of the overhead construction. “Building Information Modeling is being utilized extensively to help in the coordination of these spaces,” he says.