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Energy Lab: Empower, Invent, Industrialise

Part 2 Project 2014
Lucas Ward
 University of Plymouth | UK
Energy Lab is a multi-user energy production and research destination at the apex of two new axis and urban transitions in Cieszyn, Poland.

The proposal includes; a new station stop, access to Cieszyn Castle, fuelling and distribution centre, public square with ground floor retail, commercial, offices, and private housing.

Energy Lab builds upon the need for improved physiological conditions in the city, focusing on providing a viable alternative to coal power stations, bringing industry and education together in a creative environment that democratises technology. This is in response to the basic human need for a breathable environment, and to open up the development and direction of energy provision in the city to its citizens.

Waste streams from industries producing biological matter will be utilised as raw material for energy through a resource exchange or industrial symbiosis agreement. A process of waste matter converted to Hydrogen gas and subsequently Liquid Hydrogen as a storable energy source or through fuel cell conversion to electrical energy for heat and power will provide the core function of Energy Lab.

The project treats both the architecture and industrial processes as forms of infrastructure and technology instead of immoveable objects.

Technological process infrastructure and their localised inputs and outputs for provide spaces for specific potential development opportunities. By analysing the¬ processes for all inputs and outputs, at all stages of production, it is possible, to purposefully spread out the process so that it can be consciously manipulated in a precise manner turning Inter-connections into interfaces that users can ‘plug’ into.

The spaces are ultimately designed by the technology that can support them and vice-versa, creating a symbiotic relationship between architecture and technology to be hacked by the user. Regarding architecture as infrastructure to occupy the specified spaces as well as the infrastructure to support those spaces at a building physics level allows the users to adapt the architecture to their needs.

Energy Lab seeks to change the way both Industrial Architecture and energy production is understood and their relationships with the public, the spaces they occupy and the places they make using technology as a mediator.

Lucas Ward
Tutor(s)
Dr. Krzysztof Nawratek
2014
energy lab empower: invent, industrialise cieszyn, Poland energy lab is a multi-user energy production and research destination at the apex of two new axis and urban transitions
actor network/ input and output/ urban theory thread/ maslows hierachy of needs
urban clusters and local masterplan
diagrammatic site plan and key theoretical context
conceptualisation of core principles - the project treats both the architecture and industrial processes as forms of infrastructure and technology instead of immoveable objects.
physical investigations of space, materiality, processes, interactions, permanence, movement, form, the particular and the whole
ground floor plan and serial views moving through scale - the spaces are ultimately designed by the technology that can support them and vice-versa, creating a symbiotic relationship between architecture and technology to be hacked by the user
perspective section and programmatic floor plans - regarding architecture as infrastructure to occupy the specified spaces as well as the infrastructure to support those spaces at a building physics level allows the users to adapt the architecture to thei
serial views of key actors’ interaction - energy lab seeks to change the way both industrial architecture and energy production is understood and their relationships with the public, the spaces they occupy and the places they make using technology as a me
core technological infrastructure and production processes within the energy lab - the architecture must facilitate the process as a technological infrastructure supporting its want to evolve and therefore the building fabric is designed to accommodate as
key actor and public interaction within the energy lab - By setting up the current hydrogen production process as the first stage of a technology, regardless of how long the production method has been accepted as the norm, it is now viewed as something th
exploded detail of plug-in research and development pod
future vision and targets set into current socio-economical and political context aiming to set cieszyn as a flaghip city for regional change
during the day workshops and activities will spill out on to the street underneath the large overhanging canopy of the roof
at night the industrial towers become a showcase of illuminated sculptures on the energy lab floor
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