A Paradigm Shift in Education Awareness. Energy, innovation.

The TCII campus includes a main building that will operate at net zero energy and a photovoltaic system with 1.8 megawatt capacity.

As Technion, Cornell University and New York City get ready to put the cornerstone of the world’s first Institute of Innovation on Roosevelt Island, the winning proposal has also been applauded for its exemplary energy consciousness and it’s multidiciplinary structure of hubs.

The new campus of the Technion Cornell Institute of Innovation announced by New York Mayor Bloomberg on the 19th December, 2011, is aiming to combine cutting-edge technologies to create one of the most environmentally friendly and energy efficient campuses in the world. The proposed phase one academic building, if completed today, would be the largest net-zero energy building in eastern US; it will harvest as much energy from solar power and geothermal wells as it consumes on an annual basis. The campus will include a solar array that will generate 1.8 megawatts at daily peak and a 400 well geothermal field, which uses the constant temperature of the earth to cool buildings in the summer and heat them in the winter. The well field and solar array would each be largest in New York City.

The campus’s Built Environment hub will also help develop the environmental technologies that it will use. The concept of multidisciplinary “hubs” says Technion President Peretz Lavie, was introduced by the Technion, following its success in the best decade with focused interdisciplinary centers such as the Grand Technion Energy Program. “I am sure there will be a strong flow of science, skills and knowhow in the future between Technion’s GTEP and the new TCII,” said Lavie,

The 10-acre TCII campus – on Roosevelt Island, in the East River – will be organized around three interdisciplinary hubs: connective media, healthier life, and the built environment. Over the next 15 years, the complex will grow to include more than 1.3 million square feet of built space and, in keeping with Applied Sciences NYC’s goal of academic and business collaboration, serve as a living laboratory for energy efficient building and renewable-energy systems. By 2043, the campus is expected to include about 2 million square feet of housing for as many as 2,500 students and 280 faculty members.

A 150,000-square-foot core academic building is being designed and built to perform at net zero energy, while other campus buildings are expected to qualify for the LEED Silver or Gold standard and yield about 30% greater energy efficiency than comparably sized buildings built to code. The campus will be served by a photovoltaic system with a peak generation capacity of 1.8 megawatts. The project also will include a geothermal system with 400 wells, each about 500 feet deep, spread out over four acres.