INNOVATION July-August 2016

2015 ❖ 2016 Project Highlights

Structural Challenges at UBC’s Robert H. Lee Alumni Centre Located in the heart of the University of British Columbia’s campus, the Robert H. Lee Alumni Centre is a four-storey, 40,000-square-foot building made of concrete, steel and glass. Targeting LEED Gold certification, the second and third floors collect solar energy to help heat the building, while the interior features extensive use of local Douglas-fir wood. The building’s centrepiece is the atrium, with its free-spanning staircases clad in timber. Glotman•Simpson’s challenge as structural engineering consultant was to produce a design that kept the stairs slim, light, and without intermediate support over the 15-metre span. The project team’s solution was to hide steel trusses within the guardrails, with the stairs themselves spanning between the bottom chords of the trusses. This was modelled in E-TABS to check frequency to control vibration, and also in STAAD to establish the design forces. APEGBC members, Glotman•Simpson Consulting Engineers: Mark (Anthony) ElAraj, P.Eng., Neil Wilson, P.Eng

Detail Erection and Electrical Engineering at Telus Garden TELUS Garden is Vancouver’s first LEED Platinum office tower.The predominantly concrete building features substantial and complex steel elements. KWH Constructors and Somerset Engineering were responsible for erecting and designing the connections. Two structural steel elements required creative, detail erection engineering: the Office Bar, a four-storey cantilevered-truss office building, and the Canopy, a 73-metre steel archway at the property’s base. Permanent and temporary connections were detailed using extensive field welding to ensure a clean, aesthetically pleasing look to the exposed steel. The 22-storey tower includes energy-efficient and modern technologies to reduce energy consumption and optimise building performance. Under the Integral Group's design, heating and cooling are provided by a central plant, located in the basement, that uses waste heat from the nearby TELUS data centre as a source of heating energy via a network of hydronic piping that supports the building’s mechanical system. A rooftop solar-photovoltaic array with 70-kiloWatt capacity generates 65,000 kW/hr/yr. TELUS Garden is a smart building that delivers low-cost, efficient building services, such as lighting, thermal comfort, and air quality, with low environmental impact over the building’s life cycle. Through strategic software design and converged network infrastructure and verification,

TELUS Garden uses an integrated building automation system that includes analytics and graphics to optimise performance. APEGBC members, Somerset Engineering: Philip Sullivan, P.Eng., Raymond Florendo, P.Eng., David Hollander, P.Eng.; Integral Group: Goran Ostojic, P.Eng., Jubin Jalili, P.Eng.

49

J U LY/AU G U S T 2 016

i n n o v a t i o n