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Painting the 'Ivory Tower' green in Qatar's Education City

 
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31 Oct 2012

Qatar’s Education City is building zero-carbon footprint housing for students

Painting the 'Ivory Tower' green in Qatar's Education City

At Qatar Foundation’s Education City, late-night study sessions will soon be solar powered. Or at least, the low energy light bulbs used to burn the midnight oil will be solar powered. With solar panels almost saturating the roofs of the new 12-building residence hall complexes, covering even the shades in the car park, the structures will generate about 15 per cent of their required power from the Sun alone.

However, it is not just solar power and low electricity usage facilities that set the residence halls apart. The buildings, currently under construction, were designed according to LEED Platinum standards, the first of their kind. LEED, which stands for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, is a building standard proscribed from the US Green Building Council and it includes guidelines for six areas of design that reduce carbon footprints. These include finding a sustainable site, water usage, energy and atmosphere, materials and resources, and innovation in design.

In all of these areas, the new LEED-designed residence halls find ways to implement environmentally friendly practices. Wind turbines will provide up to 3 per cent of the complex’s energy needs. Used water from sinks will be filtered to produce grey water, which can be reused for lavatories and watering plants. Card keys will require students to be at home in order for electricity to be available in their apartment.

A significant amount of the building materials also come from the region, within an 800km radius, and concrete in the building reuses the by-product, fly-ash. Recessed windows will provide light without heating the rooms to levels that would require energy hungry air-conditioning. Precast walls allow the parts of the building to be put together like Lego blocks, significantly cutting down on construction waste.

In addition to these state-of-the-art technologies and design techniques, Qatar Foundation plans to use the residence halls as a way to bring education to students’ homes. The building’s entrance will have a screen that monitors energy use, both overall and by floor. According to Chris Silva, Sustainability Education Coordinator for Student Life, at the Office of Faculty and Student Services in the Education Division of Qatar Foundation, the screens will flash red if a building is using more energy than the previous day, yellow if the energy consumption remains stable and green if energy consumption has decreased.

“Research has shown that if people get direct feedback, there is a greater potential for change,” Mr. Silva said, referring to people’s energy consumption habits.

Mr. Silva said that there is the potential for friendly competition between floors, rewarding those whose floors use the least amount of energy, and offering advice and education to those whose energy consumption patterns remain high.

The idea for the dorms came about in 2007, when the need for more housing led to a design competition. One bold design team produced what they claimed was a feasible design according to LEED standards that would succeed despite Qatar’s trying climate. The design was conveyed to Her Highness Sheikha Moza bint Nasser, chairwomen of Qatar Foundation. Under her direction, Qatar Foundation decided that any new building for the Education City campus must be designed to at least the LEED Gold standard.

The residence halls should be ready for students by spring 2013. As for the next project, that will be green housing for graduate students and married students, Mr. Silva said.



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