Camas (Wash.) School District is planning to utilize one of three energy sources—photovoltaics, wind turbine, or geothermal—to help take its new community high school completely off the grid. The school district commissioned Interface Engineering to explore all three options for the project, which is scheduled to break ground in August.
Early findings from Interface and project architect Mahlum Architects show that wind turbines may be feasible because of the site’s close proximity to the Columbia River Gorge, which is known for its winds. The geothermal option may work because power could potentially be drawn from water in an underground channel built in the late 1800s for an adjacent paper mill. The third option arises from grants that could be used to buy rooftop PV panels.
Related Stories
| Aug 11, 2010
World's tallest all-wood residential structure opens in London
At nine stories, the Stadthaus apartment complex in East London is the world’s tallest residential structure constructed entirely in timber and one of the tallest all-wood buildings on the planet. The tower’s structural system consists of cross-laminated timber (CLT) panels pieced together to form load-bearing walls and floors. Even the elevator and stair shafts are constructed of prefabricated CLT.
| Aug 11, 2010
Setting the Green Standard For Community Colleges
“Ohlone College Newark Campus Is the Greenest College in the World!” That bold statement was the official tagline of the festivities surrounding the August 2008 grand opening of Ohlone College's LEED Platinum Newark (Calif.) Center for Health Sciences and Technology. The 130,000-sf, $58 million community college facility stacks up against some of the greenest college buildings in th...
| Aug 11, 2010
CityCenter Takes Experience Design To New Heights
It's early June, in Las Vegas, which means it's very hot, and I am coming to the end of a hardhat tour of the $9.2 billion CityCenter development, a tour that began in the air-conditioned comfort of the project's immense sales center just off the famed Las Vegas Strip and ended on a rooftop overlooking the largest privately funded development in the U.
| Aug 11, 2010
Integrated Project Delivery builds a brave, new BIM world
Three-dimensional information, such as that provided by building information modeling, allows all members of the Building Team to visualize the many components of a project and how they work together. BIM and other 3D tools convey the idea and intent of the designer to the entire Building Team and lay the groundwork for integrated project delivery.
| Aug 11, 2010
BIM school, green school: California's newest high-performance school
Nestled deep in the Napa Valley, the city of American Canyon is one of a number of new communities in Northern California that have experienced tremendous growth in the last five years. Located 42 miles northeast of San Francisco, American Canyon had a population of just over 9,000 in 2000; by 2008, that figure stood at 15,276, with 28% of the population under age 18.
| Aug 11, 2010
Great Solutions: Products
14. Mod Pod A Nod to Flex Biz Designed by the British firm Tate + Hindle, the OfficePOD is a flexible office space that can be installed, well, just about anywhere, indoors or out. The self-contained modular units measure about seven feet square and are designed to serve as dedicated space for employees who work from home or other remote locations.
| Aug 11, 2010
Special Recognition: Kingswood School Bloomfield Hills, Mich.
Kingswood School is perhaps the best example of Eliel Saarinen's work in North America. Designed in 1930 by the Finnish-born architect, the building was inspired by Frank Lloyd Wright's Prairie Style, with wide overhanging hipped roofs, long horizontal bands of windows, decorative leaded glass doors, and asymmetrical massing of elements.
| Aug 11, 2010
Great Solutions: Technology
19. Hybrid Geothermal Technology The team at Stantec saved $800,000 in construction costs by embedding geothermal piping into the structural piles at the WestJet office complex in Calgary, Alb., rather than drilling boreholes adjacent to the building site, which is the standard approach. Regular geothermal installation would have required about 200 boreholes, each about four-inches in diameter ...
