SCCN Blogs

Apple Park, A Smart Example

General

Monday, 14 October 2019

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Apple Park, the tech new headquarters that opened in 2018, was the final vision of the firm's founder: Steve Jobs. In his final public appearance before his death on October 5^th 2011 addressing a team of Cupertino council members, he said "It has got a gorgeous courtyard in the middle, and a lot more. It's a circle, so it's curved all the way round. This is not the cheapest way to build something. Every pane of glass in the main building will be curved. We have a shot at building the best office building in the world. I really do think that architecture students will come here to see it. "

Located in a sprawling 175 acre land in suburban San Francisco bay area, its iconic ring shape is a courtesy of architect Norman Foster. It houses around 14000 Apple employees in one central four-story circular building of approximately 2,800,000 square feet. Eighty percent of the campus has planted area with drought resistant trees and plants indigenous to the Cupertino area and the central portion of the building has a artificial pond. Steve Jobs wanted the whole campus to look less like an office park and more like a nature refuge.

Apple Park, which dubbed 'the spaceship' by the media due to its appearance is considered one of the greenest workspaces in the world.

Smart Campus Cloud Network (sccnhub.com) envisions the educational campuses to follow the same footprint to become carbon neutral.

Here are some facts about the building:

Energy Source : The roof of the building is completely covered by solar panels giving a total installed capacity of whopping 17 MW. During peak hours the solar panels provides 75% of the total energy needs of the building. The installed solar panels are supplemented by additional 4MW solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) which use biofuel or natural gas.

Cycling : There are 1,000 bikes on the campus for employees to get around, with miles of cycling and jogging trails all over the 175-acre campus. There are an additional 2,000 bicycle parking spaces in the subterranean car parking garage.

A building that breaths: The Natural ventilation uses flaps and sensors to circulate air and measure where from and how much the wind is blowing. Furthermore, tubes of water have been placed within the concrete floors and ceilings to help keep the temperature in a comfortable middle ground. All of this is done to prevent the central heating and cooling system from kicking in, which are only reserved for the most extreme temperatures.

- Kaushik Kodali, IT Coordinator TERRE Policy Centre