The UCI Health – Irvine Medical Center embraces UCI’s commitment to sustainable design and is on course to be the first all-electrical hospital in the nation. This distinction responds to the University of California policy restricting fossil fuel combustion for space and water heating. Its design breaks new ground in the pursuit of carbon-free healthcare operations with an all-electric central plant and energy-saving strategies. Delivered using the design-build method, the contractor and architect closely collaborated through each stage of the project to ensure the design achieves stringent performance metrics and responds to the medical center’s unique location adjacent to the protected San Joaquin Marsh.
The result is a medical center that establishes harmony between the natural environment and architecture. The project comprises a 350,000 GSF specialty hospital, 220,000 GSF ambulatory care and cancer center (ACC), parking structure and a 42,000 GSF all-electric central plant. The hospital includes emergency, specialty inpatient nursing, surgical, imaging, and support services, while the ACC features surgical and procedural services, cancer clinics, infusion and translational research. The buildings are connected at the lowest level to create a single interventional platform, consolidating staff, operations and support space.
One level above, an entry-level plaza serves as a focal point of the campus, accommodating gardens and congregation areas with uninterrupted views of the marsh. Hospitals are designed first and foremost to improve and protect human health but are also inexorably linked to roughly 10% of carbon emissions in the United States. To achieve high-performance standards, the design uses a variety of energy-efficient approaches, such as sunshades, self-shading, green power, and preserving the San Joaquin Marsh Reserve.
The architects employed high-efficiency glazing and other shading devices, including dual horizontal sunshades and a custom vertical ceramic frit pattern that doubly creates a bird-friendly surface in consideration of the adjoining wetlands’ bird populations. These methods will contribute to reducing the solar heat gain by 85%. To ensure that the project did not damage the marsh, the design-build team also worked with UCI biologists to position the buildings appropriately, create a buffer to protect the animals, and to guarantee that any runoff from the site was not harmful to the local ecosystem if properly treated first.
The exteriors mitigate solar heat gain and glare while preserving views by using specific glazing and insulation materials and a balanced mix of opaque and transparent units. As a unique highly biophilic healthcare destination, the medical center transitions urban complexity to the natural world and will contribute to protecting the environment through its all-electric design. Designed to last for 70+ years, the medical center will be a prominent symbol of UCI Health and UC Irvine’s commitment to sustainability and top-tier healthcare. The project provides the highest specialty clinical programs of a prestigious academic medical, teaching and research institution, while seamlessly melding energy efficiency through solar control with efficient and carbon-free operations.
Category:ArchitectureYear:2024Location: Irvine, California, USAArchitects:CO ArchitectsLead Architect:Thomas Chessum, FAIA and Gina Chang, AIA, EDACLandscape Architects:Ridge Landscape ArchitectsGeneral Contractor: Hensel Phelps Construction Co.Client:UCI HealthPhotographers:Kilograph/Keely Colcleugh