Golisano Center Masters Sustainability and Science

LEWISTON, N.Y. — A comprehensive science facility poses unique challenges for any builder looking to achieve LEED Gold. But William Duquin, construction manager for Niagara University in Lewiston, was able to pull together the resources needed to make the new B. Thomas Golisano Center for Integrated Sciences one of the most environmentally responsible education facilities in the U.S.

The Golisano Center earned LEED Gold this month, almost a year after it opened to faculty and students. The 50,000-square-foot, $33 million integrated science center houses 18 laboratories, which are supported by designated areas for nuclear magnetic resonance, tissue culture, imaging, plant growth, radioisotope storage and numerous other functions.

Chemicals and exhaust from laboratory fume hoods aren’t exactly eco-friendly. What’s more, they present a danger to the building’s occupants. In addition to ensuring construction was meeting all other requirements for LEED certification, Duquin wanted to make sure students and faculty were breathing high quality air and would be safe from chemicals.

“At one end of the building, there’s an atrium on the first floor, a lecture hall and classroom, and on the second floor there’s 15 offices. So it’s broken down into admin and science with two separate air handlers,” Duquin said.

With a separated air handler for the science sections of the building, this allowed for that one air handler to pump in 100 percent outside air to laboratories. Additionally, a heat recovery unit recaptures all the exhaust from fume hoods and whatever else is produced in the labs. The facility’s high efficiency HVAC system scored valuable points for the LEED checklist, and with a sophisticated energy management system that’s tied into the rest of the campus, facility services staff can control and monitor conditions in just about every room in the building.

“Even with all these fume hoods,” Duquin said, “we were still able to pick up the gold rating.”

The functionality of the building is also addressed in the chosen flooring. Laboratories are designed to minimize the risk of spills, but accidents do happen. Keeping in mind that this needed to be a sustainable building, Duquin and his team chose a flooring system that never needs waxing, finishing or sealing, and is chemical resistant. The nora rubber flooring that was used is a dense, nonporous and dirt-repellant surface that only needs a high-speed buffer and water. Although he was skeptical at first, Duquin was “sold on this product,” he said.

During construction, special care was also taken to ensure the flooring plus any adhesive sealants, paints, carpets and any fiber wood were low VOC.

Another special feature for the building is a rain garden built to collect runoff from the roof. In addition to acting as a heat island, the roof funnels rainwater into spouts. “It’s a flat-roof building, so we have all of this rain coming down through basically what look like brass spouts coming out of the side of the building and then dumping down into a splash pad and then leaching down into a rain garden,” Duquin said. “Roughly 80 percent of total suspended solids are removed.”

Building a rain garden was a first for Duquin, but the building is successfully allowing rainwater a chance to absorb instead of flowing into storm drains.

The center hits a number of other LEED criteria, including automatic controls for nonemergency lighting; no permanent irrigation system; bicycle storage racks; preferred parking for low-emission vehicles; materials manufactured using recycled materials; materials from locations within 500 miles; certified woods; thermostat control for each room; 90 percent of spaces with natural light; and enhanced commissioning to ensure construction was in line with standards.

Fortunately, Duquin said, the center was not the first LEED-certified building in the area, but that didn’t mean the project didn’t have obstacles. “We had a general contractor not familiar with this whole system who was thinking, how can we possibly sort all of this debris? How can we get certified material within 500 miles? It was all a learning curve.”