Project overview
Oberlander Architects’ Life Sciences Innovation Hub at the University of Dundee is a building that takes its environmental responsibilities as seriously as its economic ones. Delivered as part of the Tay Cities Deal, the 54,000 square foot facility is forecast to support 800 new life sciences jobs and generate £190 million of regional benefit by 2053. Sustainability is not a feature here, it is the foundation of the project.
A post-tensioned concrete frame reduces material use across the building while meeting the demanding performance requirements of laboratory environments, where structural loads, vibration control and services integration all place exceptional pressure on a building’s fabric. The envelope goes well beyond minimum regulatory standards for airtightness and insulation, and operational energy demand is met through a ground source heat pump system drawing on shallow borehole technology, displacing fossil fuel consumption at the point of use.
Orientation has been considered a passive sustainability tool throughout. The building is arranged to maximise useful daylight, manage solar gain and reduce the need for artificial lighting and mechanical cooling. A generous central atrium draws natural light deep into the plan while supporting the wider ventilation strategy.
Blockleys Bowland Grey, an extruded wirecut brick with a grey multi finish, clads the laboratory wing and the harder urban edge of the building facing the adjacent industrial area. Brick requires no coating, no periodic replacement and minimal maintenance over a building’s lifetime. In a district designed to grow and evolve over decades, specifying a material that performs without intervention is itself a sustainability decision
