Rørbæk og Møller Arkitekter’s 3,000-square-metre extension to DTU’s existing Skylab is designed to meet the requirements of DGNB’s new Diamond certification, which on top of environmental, social, and financial sustainability, evaluates the building’s longevity in terms of architectural and aesthetic qualities.
Building green diamonds When it comes to sustainability, gold standards are not enough for Rørbæk og Møller Arkitekter and the Technical University of Denmark (DTU). With the design for DTU Skylab, a new 3,000-square-metre extension to the university’s successful innovation hub, DTU is going for a German Sustainable Building Council (DGNB) Diamond certification. This requires the building to be not only environmentally, socially, and financially sustainable, but of the highest architectural quality as well. By Signe Hansen | Photos: Rørbæk og Møller Arkitekter
While a lot of attention is paid to the carbon footprint of the transport and food industry, the building industry often goes unmentioned – this despite the fact that it accounts for around 40 per cent of Denmark’s total energy consumption. This fact is one of the reasons sustainability is at the core of Rørbæk og Møller Arkitekter’s work. Partner Nicolai Overgaard explains: “Sustainability is a question of social responsibility, and that’s always been a core value at our firm, which is why we focus on sustainability at every stage of our projects – from 60 | Issue 129 | October 2019
the first rudimentary sketches, to the proposals and all the little details that are added as the project is realised.” While Rørbæk og Møller Arkitekter has worked with sustainability for decades, DGNB’s award system (adapted by the Danish Green Building Council in 2011) now makes it possible to fulfil an increasing demand from clients for documented sustainability. But more incrementally, it provides the firm with a tool to measure its performance at each stage of the design process, explains partner Anders Wesley
Hansen. “To our firm, it’s been important to get a tool with which we can direct and guide the design and planning phase, because that’s where the real difference is created. You can design a building and then try to amend it to make it more sustainable, but that’s too late; sustainability needs to be part of the core concept, otherwise it becomes very expensive.”
More than gold Set to be finished in 2020, Rørbæk og Møller Arkitekter’s 3,000-squaremetre extension to DTU’s existing Skylab is designed to meet the requirements of DGNB’s new Diamond certification, which on top of environmental, social, and financial sustainability, evaluates the building’s longevity in terms of architectural and aesthetic qualities. “The core aim behind the DTU Skylab design was to preserve and promote the