Team Meets to Discuss Path Forward for Sagehen Creek Field Station Project
Sept. 29, 2011: Inna Gritsak, The Boldt Company
One day the Sagehen Creek Field Station North of Truckee, California may become the greenest facility in the world. Making that dream a reality was the topic of discussion at a planning session September 26.
Since the project is in the very early stages of planning, the primary goal of the meeting was to identify the project’s path forward and discuss funding options.
Present at the meeting were Jay Harris and Cormwell Burgos from Boldt, Jeff Brown and Faerthen Felix from Sagehen, Don Clark and James Molder from Cathexes, Violet Nakayama from UC Berkeley, and Jonathan Long from the USDA Forest Service Pacific Southwest Research Station.
Currently, the Sagehen Creek Field Station is a year-round natural laboratory managed by the University of California, Berkeley in collaboration with the Tahoe National Forest and the Forest Service Pacific Southwest Research Station. The alliance works together for the common goal of promoting excellence in research and education in a natural environmentally-functioning eco-system.
Current conditions of the facility, however, are aging, poorly sited and no longer meet current and projected user needs for offices, classrooms, storage space, research facilities and housing.
The September 26 meeting was the fourth meeting for the project.
An important topic on the meeting agenda was how to locate the financial resources for the project since most funding needs to come from private donors.
Other items on the agenda included the vision for the project’s design, contract method, entitlements, preliminary work, conditions of satisfaction, corporate participation, target budget business drivers, documentation, and participation from contributors.
Boldt was invited to participate in the project due to the company’s experience with Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) and its offer to assist with pursuing project funding.
“Boldt is very passionate about sustainability and being a good steward of the environment so this is the kind of project Tom Boldt would be very excited to see his company participate in,” Harris said.
Boldt was the contractor for the Leopold Center in Fairfield, Wisconsin, which is known as the first carbon neutral building certified by LEED. This means annual operations of the facility account for no net gain in carbon dioxide emissions. The LEED program awarded the Leopold Center 61 out of 69 possible points, which happens to be more than any other building in the United States.
The goal of the Sagehen Creek Field Station project is to get all 69 points from LEED.
Besides locating the funds for this project, the other challenge lies in designing it to be the greenest building in the world.
The goal is to make the facility as self-sufficient as possible. Bio mass power, use of local materials, solid waste management and recycling will be integrated into the project.
Cathexes, the designer and architect for the project, plans to design the building to reflect the imagery and feeling of the place, use indigenous materials and ultimately, make a home in the wild. The essence of the design should reflect the concept of earth, sun and water.
The US Forest Service also has influence on the project’s design and construction. Although UC Berkeley owns and operates the Sagehen Creek Field Station facility, the land on which it stands is owned by the US Forest Service. The field station is instrumental in assisting the US Forest Service research in forest management. The Forest Service will start harvesting logs next summer as part of their forest thinning program and the logs will be stored on site for later use in constructing the facility.
Confirming the project’s program and scope of work was also an item on the agenda; however, there remain too many unknowns to establish the entire program.
Harris also presented an overview of Boldt’s philosophy of Integrated Lean Project Delivery (ILPD), which would be the preferred delivery method for designing and building the project. Clark presented an overview of the Cathexes design.
All in all, the meeting was productive and all meeting agenda points were addressed.
Most importantly, a path forward was determined. Harris, Brown and Clark will continue to hold weekly conference calls or meetings to discuss project developments. At the same time, Brown will be asking George Nolte, a supporter of the Sagehen project and Leopold board member, to coordinate with Tom Boldt, Chairman of the Leopold board to determine Leopold’s participation in this project. Planning meetings will continue on an as-needed basis.
Finally got a weather window to burn some slash piles around the station today: 2 at the Leopold Cabin, 2 at the Lower Camp.
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