On September 27th the San Francisco California Academy of Sciences (CAS) finally opened it’s doors in Golden Gate Park after five years in a temporary location at 875 Howard Street. The new building design is strait out of a Teletubbies pipe dream and features a landscaped flower garden aviary roof with solar panels and massive skylights. The designer is an Italian architect named Renzo Piano who is recognized for winning both the Pritzker Architecture Prize in 1998 (which is considered the top industry honor in architecture), and the American Institute of Architects’ Gold Medal in 2008. His latest design for the Academy of Science is so environmentally friendly that it is expected to earn platinum Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design (LEED) certification.
One of the most notable features of this new museum architecture is its “living roof” mentioned earlier and shown just above. It includes 1.7 million native California plants such as strawberries, California poppies, grasses, and other berries that all support local birds and insects. The roof itself has been constructed using fifty thousand biodegradable connector trays made of coconut husks and tree sap. Not only will the fauna on the roof support wildlife, convert CO2 to Oxygen, and act as insulation, it also absorbs over 98% of the rainfall (~3.8 million gallons per year) that hits the building which reduces runoff into the nearby Pacific Ocean.
Inside the building, radiant heaters warm the floor in winter months and sixty thousand photovoltaic cells on solar panels supply the academy with energy, nearly 5% of it’s total needs. The Academy was founded in 1853 and has moved several times over the years. For more information call 415-379-8000 or visit the new website at www.calacademy.org
