| Buck Center for Research on Aging
Marin County, CA Mechanical and Electrical Engineers Completion Date: 1999 (Phase I) Architects: Pei Cobb Freed & Partners Area: 165,000 s/f (Phase I); 355,000 s/f (Total)
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This campus research center will ultimately consist of five linked buildings around a one-acre hexagonal courtyard. The project program included research laboratories, animal holding pens, offices, and educational facilities for research on human aging. This facility is served by redundant HVAC systems, which control temperatures, indoor relative humidity, and filters and manages the flow of supply air to each space. A central control system manages the numerous exhaust systems to protect against cross contamination from space to space. This is accomplished through pressurization controls, which maintain the appropriate indoor air pressure of each space.
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The first phase, completed in 1999, included the administration building and the first of three research modules. A new central heating/cooling plant for the overall complex is located in the administration building. The plant employed three electric centrifugal chillers with a first phase capacity of 750 tons. The chillers were specified with non-CFC or HCFC type refrigerants. The central plant contains the chillers, boilers, cooling towers, and emergency and standby electric generators. The heating boilers are of the firetube type generating low-pressure steam, which is distributed around the campus. In addition, a battery of high pressure steam boilers of special construction were provided to produce process "clean" steam for use in sterilization equipment, autoclaves, specialty laboratory equipment, and for space humidification. |