Photo courtesy of Chris Lark
MSU STEM Facility Connects Nature to Learning — and Learning to Nature — with Biophilic Design and Mass Timber Creation By Lisa M. Briggs
M
ichigan State University achieved something no else in the state of Michigan has ever done – it built a $110 million, 173,000square-foot educational superstructure using mass timber, specifically crosslaminated timber (CLT). This type of timber is an engineered type of multilayered wood extending in two directions; it has strength, sustainability and is moisture resistant, and it requires no sanding, painting or staining. The development transformed the longabandoned Shaw Lane Power Plant into a new instructional space that helps meet increased STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) course demand for MSU students. “Old silos are now conference rooms and the 1964 limestone entrance welcomed the return of Spartan students. Original steam boilers and mechanical hardware are art installations,” according to MSU officials. The adaptive re-use of the power plant makes this one of five buildings in the United States that 20 CAM MAGAZINE OCTOBER 2021
has undergone such a transformation. The unique building is drawing significant attention in the industry, including from the Michigan Department of Natural Resources – the agency hosted an inaugural Mass Timber Summit to promote more commercialized construction projects like this in the state of Michigan. Extensive additions and renovations were built by Granger Construction Company on the north and south side of the power plant. The 40,000square-foot, former coal burning facility adjacent to MSU’s Spartan Stadium is gone – but not all of it. Deciding to Build with Mass Timber “The idea to adopt a new STEM pedagogy and collaborative learning environment for students started back in 2016,” said Jeff Bonk, MSU Infrastructure, Planning and Facilities (IPF) Project Delivery ManagerDesign Manager. “A year later they started the design and brought on partners, members of the campus community,
stakeholders, and that’s when the idea to use mass timber as a product came about. With encouragement from the state of Michigan in the form of a grant and support from the Department of Agriculture, we stopped looking at mass timber as a potential way to build and said this is something we are going to do. It’s an innovative product, and what better way to put teaching on display than by using an innovative building product such as mass timber. The biophilic and environmental piece is an added benefit.” The original state of the wood is a correlation to the concept of this project being a biophilic building. “We left the wood exposed,” said Bonk. “We are also a construction management school on campus, as well as forestry, and environmental sciences, so sustainability is a big thing for MSU. The structure, it is really untouched or unstained, it’s in the original state as it was delivered to us.” The original state of the wood is part of the biophilic design unique to this “The Voice of The Construction Industry®”
