Jay Arehart News

Students' building designs to be presented at Expo

Susan Glairon — Tue, 15 Apr 2025 15:38:51 +0000

Students' building designs to be presented at Expo Susan Glairon Tue, 04/15/2025 - 09:38

Susan Glairon

Meet Dana Majer, C6C design team member

What did you learn that will help in your future career?

Our senior design capstone project brought together everything we’ve learned over the past four years—from technical skills to teamwork, to communication, to project management. Collaborating with a team of six, we not only applied our engineering knowledge, but also honed our ability to communicate ideas clearly, listen actively and work effectively as a group. Writing proposals and presenting our work added another layer of professionalism. Seeing our final building and product come together affirmed how these skills will translate directly into our future careers—which is really exciting!

What did you enjoy most about this class?

I enjoyed collaborating with my peers. It was incredibly rewarding to share the excitement of completing our deliverables and presenting our ideas. Spending so many hours together brought us closer, and the camaraderie made the experience even more memorable!

Why are you participating in Expo?

We’ve presented to engineering professionals and faculty. Sharing our work with the broader public will be a new and exciting experience.

91��ý’s architectural engineering capstone students took on a challenge to design a 20,000-square-foot student support building. Their mission? Create a space for the Business Field on the university's main campus that fosters connection—housing student services, graduate offices, study areas and meeting rooms—while helping to frame the Business Field as a welcoming gateway to campus.

Six student teams tackled the same prompt and delivered six very different designs. They'll present their work to the CU and Boulder communities during the Engineering Projects Expo 2025, held April 25 at the CU Indoor Practice Facility.

The university has no current plans to use the students’ designs to construct the building, but that wasn't the point, said Jay Arehart, an assistant teaching professor and faculty director for architectural engineering. The project mirrors real-world constraints and expectations, offering students a hands-on experience in turning ideas into concrete solutions, he said.

Arehart leads the senior design class, emphasizing its pivotal role in his students' education. In earlier courses, students focus on designing individual systems, such as steel structures, he said. However, the senior design class challenges them to integrate these components into a single, cohesive building.

Assistant Teaching Professor Jay Arehart

"They're having to problem solve and work to balance the design objective of multiple disciplines," Arehart said. "They need to think about the lighting design, the cost of the different systems, the sustainability impacts. The class is about putting a whole building together holistically, not just designing a system in isolation."

During the capstone class, a panel of industry professionals gave feedback on students’ technical presentations at three key points during the academic year. Expo, he said, offers students a chance to present their work to a broader, less technical audience.

"Expo is a chance to give an elevator pitch about their design and not get deep in the weeds," he said. "Instead, they're zooming out and thinking, 'What does this project mean for this person asking questions?'"

Learn more about our undergraduate architectural engineering program

Architectural engineers focuses on the design and construction of safe and sustainable buildings. They are creative problem solvers meeting the challenges of energy needs, building systems and community planning. While architectural engineers work with architects, they are engineers – not architects.

Team 1: Unified Engineers

Cindia Denova Garduno, Ammar Alqallaf, Colin Finnerty, Yousef Alqallaf, Daniela Brown and Jassim Almossallam

Description

To support the growth and dynamic needs of CU’s student community, the Student Success Center serves as a cornerstone of campus life-architecturally rooted by the iconic Flatirons and the surrounding Brutalist architectural style of the Engineering Center. Designed as a LEED Gold-performing faculty, it provides occupants with a comfortable indoor environment achieved through sustainable practices that align with CU Campus carbon reduction goals. The Student Success Center provides student-tailored spaces such as classrooms, meeting rooms, study spaces and a light-filled atrium that fosters collaboration, academic success and inclusivity.

Team 2: KWT Team 2024

Sarah AlRubaie, Maha Madooh, Sherifa Aldharman, Maryam Alfeeli and Sadan Almukhtar

Description

Our building design creates a welcoming and functional community space that seamlessly blends aesthetics. The structure features a dynamic mix of traditional and modern elements, including a large glass curtain wall that maximizes daylighting and enhances visual connectivity between interior and exterior spaces. The sloped roof design and varying volumes help define different program areas while supporting passive solar strategies. Unique to our solution is the emphasis on openness and accessibility highlighted by multiple entry points, outdoor seating and a transparent atrium that invites collaboration and engagement. Our group’s goal was to foster inclusivity, promote natural light use and prioritize energy efficiency, resulting in a design that serves both environmental and social functions.

Team 3: C6C Design

Dana Majer, Macy Will, Ryleigh Taylor, Alex Pentecost, Lars Chang and Josh Kilareski.

Description

Our 25,000-square-foot Student Success Center includes 10 classrooms, a variety of study spaces, an open atrium and an interior and exterior roof terraces to support students, staff and visitors. The design blurs the boundaries between the building and site, instructing and learning and tradition and advancement. The team worked to achieve LEED Platinum and low embodied carbon by considering a multitude of factors, including indoor air quality, materiality and optimized energy usage.

Team 4: Kuwait

Alaa Alnajar, Yaqoub Salem, Nourah AlTaher, Sarah Aldhafiri, Deema Alhouli, Shekhah Alkhudhari

Description

Our 22,000-square-foot Student Success Center is designed to assist a variety of learning and interaction styles. The building includes 14 classrooms, four meeting rooms and two open study spaces. The exterior building maintains a modern aesthetic while using 91��ý's characteristic sandstone to link the structure to the architectural identity of the university. Large glazing lets in natural light and provides stunning views of the Flatirons, providing a stimulating setting for students. The elevated bridge linking the two wings of the Student Success Center is a major distinguishing feature of our design, offering easy access between areas and improving the general user experience. The building's bold geometry, open circulation and careful integration of indoor and outdoor areas reflects our project objectives to promote student success, enhance community and honor the natural and architectural character of 91��ý.

Team 5: Trussworthy Engineers

Brayden Gurien, Rebeca Perez, Kai Cunha, Cami Campbell, Maja Sakiewicz, Caroline Mumm

Description

The TRUS Building at the University of Colorado Boulder blends adaptability, sustainability and innovation through an integrated design process to meet the evolving needs of students and staff. Energy-efficient systems and sustainable materials used in the building align with 91��ý’s long-term environmental goals, including LEED Gold certification and carbon reduction. Unique features like curved entrances, a central atrium and large windows framing stunning views of the Flatirons create a strong connection between the built environment and its natural surroundings. The TRUS Building also promotes inclusivity with all-gender restrooms, ADA-compliant facilities and wellness spaces. Designed for future expansion, it will remain a functional, innovative space for decades, offering a forward-thinking solution to the university’s needs.

Team 6: Six-Pack Drill Thrillers

George Kurz, Jason Pelzel, Gianni Carbonaro, Erik Eisenrich, Dominick Gomez, Kale Dohrman

Description

The Center for Learning and Innovation (CLI) Building is a proposed 21,000- square-foot classroom building with a central atrium branching to three stories of classrooms, offices and study spaces. The central atrium is a unique addition to the CU vernacular, providing a communal space promoting the intermixing of students. Steel columns rise from the ground 48 feet into the air and connect into the steel beams that support elevated concrete slabs on each story. Additionally, an overhang on the east end provides cover from the elements for students waiting for the CU buses on Regent Drive. The CLI’s structural systems will primarily be made with recycled steel where applicable and fly ash concrete to reduce the carbon footprint. Each classroom and building zone feature its own heat pump and temperature controls, ensuring maximum thermal comfort in each space any time of year. The lighting design features efficient and tasteful fixtures that improve the efficiency of the building and support the health of students.

Team 7

Sanbebablic Alnaser

Description

Our goal was to design a building that blends with campus buildings and achieves LEED Gold certification. The building was planned with privacy and flexibility spanning three floors. The ground floor consists of 5,000-square-feet of south and west-side classrooms to accommodate 30 to 55 students, a 1,000-square-foot study room and an 800-square-foot lobby and reception space for easy access to the facilities. The second-floor accommodates 5,000-square-feet of classroom space for small groups, 1,500-square-feet of faculty office space and 500-square-feet of meeting rooms. The third floor has quiet study spaces with 1,500-square-feet and 4,000-square-feet for senior faculty and administrative offices and 500-square-feet of large meeting rooms. The structure is constructed using a reinforced concrete frame system for strength, flexibility and economy.

Seven teams from 91��ý's architectural engineering capstone class will present their building design ideas to the public at the university's Engineering Projects Expo 2025. Each team designed a 20,000-square-foot student support building for the Business Field on the university's main campus.

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Architectural engineering receives DOE Zero Energy Design Designation

Anonymous — Tue, 04 Oct 2022 15:04:04 +0000

Architectural engineering receives DOE Zero Energy Design Designation Anonymous (not verified) Tue, 10/04/2022 - 09:04

Susan Glairon

91��ý’s architectural engineering Bachelor of Science degree program has earned a Zero Energy Design Designation from the U.S. Department of Energy.

The new DOE designation, awarded to 17 educational programs nationwide, recognizes the growing importance of zero-energy design, which means a building produces as much energy as it consumes in a year. The designation honors post-secondary academic programs that require students to apply the best practices of zero energy design in their projects.

Jennifer Scheib, an assistant teaching professor who led 91��ý’s 2021 Solar Decathlon team to a first-place win, said the new designation recognizes the program’s longtime sustainability focus.

“It’s not just us saying we care about sustainability,” Scheib said. “A third party reviewed our curriculum and said, ‘Yes, this program is focused on sustainability.’ Not only are we an accredited engineering program, but sustainability is part of our course goals.”

The Zero Energy Design Designation Program supports the Biden-Harris Administration’s goal of a net-zero emissions economy by 2050. With buildings being one of the main contributors to carbon emissions, building professionals must be trained to design and construct high-efficiency, low-carbon buildings powered by renewables to achieve this goal, the DOE said. Today, 35 percent of the nation’s energy-related carbon dioxide emissions are attributed to buildings.

The program’s senior design capstone class, taught by Assistant Teaching Professor Jay Arehart, is at the core of the DOE designation, Scheib said. The senior capstone class gives all students — not just those able to participate in the Solar Decathlon build activity — the opportunity to learn about sustainability goals and design and modeling practices for buildings and to put those skills to use on a large design project. During the year-long course, fourth-year students design a zero-energy commercial building.

91��ý has participated five times in the DOE’s Solar Decathlon competition’s build program, winning first place in 2002, 2005, and 2021, and their involvement in the decathlon led to Scheib sending in the curriculum and meeting with DOE staff for consideration for the Zero Energy designation. During the collegiate competition, students design and build high-performance, low-carbon buildings that mitigate climate change and are affordable, resilient and energy efficient.

“Our students are our future,” Scheib said. “If they want a sustainable world for themselves and their children, they need to be aware of the amount of energy used in the built environment. We want to make sure they have those skills.”

Scheib added that zero-energy building is not only important for society, but also for the students’ pathway after graduation.

“It’s important for us to also let employers know that our students have those skills,” she said. “Employers want young people who know how to energy model.”

The new DOE designation, awarded to 17 educational programs nationwide, honors post-secondary academic programs that require students to apply the best practices of zero energy design in their projects.

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Bloomberg: The Best Cities for Low Carbon Emissions Aren’t the Tallest

Anonymous — Mon, 30 Aug 2021 15:58:01 +0000

Bloomberg: The Best Cities for Low Carbon Emissions Aren’t the Tallest Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 08/30/2021 - 09:58

As the world continues to urbanize, cities are reaching new heights every year. The southern Chinese city of Shenzhen, for example, built 14 new skyscrapers in 2018 alone. The pursuit of such lofty living spaces follows the conventional thinking that it’s more sustainable for growing cities to build up than build out.

Compact, high-rise cities are the antithesis to urban sprawl, and in theory, they limit the carbon footprint of the built environment in part because they can house more people in fewer structures. That’s significant considering that buildings currently account for more than half of a city’s emissions on average. Living in a dense city is also notably less energy-intensive, on a per-person basis, than spread-out suburban or rural life.

But a new study suggests that while density is indeed necessary to limit the greenhouse gas emissions of a growing population, height is not. In fact, a densely packed city of low-rises — think central Paris, where buildings typically stay below 10 stories — may be the best kind of urban environment for curbing carbon, even if they use more land than a high-rise-filled one that accommodates the same number of people, according to the researchers.

“The architectural futurism in which the way buildings have been depicted over the last five years has really focused on skyscrapers that have trees hanging off of them, and that appear to be very green,” says Jay Arehart, an architectural engineer at University of Colorado Boulder and a coauthor of the report, published last week in the journal npj Urban Sustainability. “But in reality they’re not.”

At least not always.

He says the calculation begins to change when you consider the emissions generated over the entire lifecycle of a city’s built environment, including the manufacturing of construction materials and the deconstruction of old buildings — not just what’s produced to keep the lights on. “As soon as you start building taller, you need more materials,” he says, pointing to the need for bigger foundations and larger steel columns, for example, which in turn involve more embodied, or hidden, carbon.

There are also limitations to how densely developers can realistically pack high-rises, and how many people those buildings can house — which affect both land use and efficiency. Skyscrapers require large footprints and gaps between like-sized buildings, and as they grow taller, the usable space on each floor diminishes. “When you look at New York, for instance, the spaces between buildings are actually quite significant in comparison to more low-rise environments, like in any late 19th century European city,” Arehart says.

To compare the full lifecycle emissions of various urban environments, Arehart and his colleagues at Edinburgh Napier University started by simulating 5,000 built environments of varying population sizes and land area availability. They then classified each into one of four different urban typologies: high-density and low-density environments with either high-rise or low-rise buildings. To simulate how those environments might realistically form, the models were based on real-world data from different cities across the U.K. and Europe, including London, Berlin, Oslo and Vienna.

The authors use real-world data to simulate four types of urban environment of varying densities and building height.

npj Urban Sustainability

Comparing these simulated cities, researchers found that for all population sizes (which range from 20,000 to 50,000), the lifetime carbon emissions increase along with building height, independent of the amount of land needed. High-density, high-rise cities also resulted in the largest carbon emissions compared to the other three models — and that includes low-density, low-rise scenarios that resemble suburban-styled cities. The lowest carbon emitters were high-density, low-rise configurations.

For a city supporting 20,000 people, moving from low rises to high rises without changing the density results in 140% more carbon emissions. For a city of 50,000 people, the increase is slightly lower, at 132%.

In scenarios in which researchers observed the number of people each typology can house in a given amount of land, they found that high-density, low-rise cities on average can support more than twice as many people as high-density, high-rise cities without increasing carbon emissions.

Arehart is careful to say that the study focuses solely on building emissions, and doesn’t account for other factors like transportation, design or the type of land cities build on, which affect their carbon output. More study is also needed to confirm if their conclusions still hold true for increasingly larger populations.

“The takeaway here shouldn’t be that skyscrapers are bad,” he says. But reconsider them as the solution to our current climate crisis.

The debate itself isn’t new. While experts generally agree unchecked urban sprawl is detrimental to the environment, the negative impacts of supertall buildings — which rack up massive amounts of embodied energy and typically demand yet more power to heat, cool, and run elevators, compared to shorter structures — are a focus of growing attention. The recent report from the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change points to cities’ urban geometry as one of three main factors contributing to the urban heat island effect: Tall buildings placed in close proximity tend to trap heat and reduce natural ventilation.

“We're showing you an example of how you can use greenhouse gas emission to evaluate urban density,” says Arehard. “That's just one piece of the puzzle.” Ultimately, how tall a city should build depends on multiple environmental and socioeconomic factors, including affordable housing needs and greening efforts.

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Cities like Paris may be optimal urban form for reducing greenhouse gas emissions

Anonymous — Tue, 10 Aug 2021 21:20:33 +0000

Cities like Paris may be optimal urban form for reducing greenhouse gas emissions Anonymous (not verified) Tue, 08/10/2021 - 15:20

Researchers at 91��ý are part of a newly published study that finds that low-rise, high-density environments like those found in Paris are the optimal urban form when looking to reduce greenhouse gas emissions over their whole life cycle.

The work, recently published in npj Urban Sustainability, builds on a growing debate around the design of future urban environments and was done in partnership with Edinburgh Napier University. The built environment is a big contributor to carbon emissions, global energy demand, resource consumption and waste generation. In the U.S., it accounts for 39% of all greenhouse gases emissions, while in the European Union, it accounts for 50% of all extracted materials and 42% of the final energy consumption – making it a rich area for understanding and improvement related to climate change.

Jay Arehart, an author on the paper and instructor in the Department of Civil, Environmental and Architectural Engineering, said the work challenges current conventional understanding that tomorrow’s cities must be densely packed and stretch upwards to address and curb greenhouse gas emissions. The idea being that tall buildings make optimal use of space, reduce operational energy use for heating and cooling and enable more people to be accommodated per square meter of land.

“Both the urban sprawl that we see in the suburbs of the United States and the high-rise that we see in places like New York City are not necessarily optimal,” Arehart said. “We showed that new development should focus on minimizing whole-life carbon of buildings, not just the emissions from their operations or their materials. That density is needed for a growing urban population, but height isn't.”

The team investigated four different urban typologies – from dense-and-tall to sparse-and-low – by simulating 5,000 environments based on real-world data to establish their lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions. This approach considered both premium for land (the extra land needed to build low-rise compared to high-rise) and premium for height (the extra materials to build high-rise compared to low-rise) to make comparisons fair said Francesco Pomponi, the lead author on the paper and professor at Edinburgh Napier University.

"We developed a novel urban density metric to measure things up as accurately as possible," Pomponi said. "Our results show that density is indeed needed for a growing urban population, but height isn't. So it seems the world needs more Parises and fewer Manhattans – as much as I love New York – in the next decades."

Urban Sustainability is the newest addition to the Nature Partner Journals series.

Full paper

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