Abstract:

Can something as environmentally and politically contentious as a data center coexist with its surroundings more harmoniously? Industrial structures are largely overlooked as design objects and cast into the very background of human life. While being critical about data centers’ resource consumption, I was curious to approach this type of building as something that can exist side-by-side with humanity, natural ecologies and other industries intentionally and humbly.

My project questions how architecture can enable a circular flow of energy and materials in combining a data center with a wood-drying kiln. It aims to create a symbiotic relationship between the two typologies, asking how the programs can benefit each other.

The proposed hybrid building can redirect the flow of energy and matter on the site, by making use of by-products such as offcuts from the sawmill, heat from the data center and steam from the kiln. The building envelope aims to constrain and direct airflow through insulated mass and openings. Thus, heavy panels of non-structural heavy timber are suspended from an exoskeleton of columns

The project speculates that future data centers could be situated on sawmill campuses, the number of which might increase due to the need for forest thinning operations in California. This offers a chance to combine two industrial typologies that are unwanted near residential areas due to noise and pollution.