Boulder Commons

Boulder, Colorado

Architect
Coburn Architecture

Overview
Located just two miles from downtown Boulder, Colorado, Boulder Commons is a net-zero energy development consisting of two commercial buildings totaling roughly 100,000 square feet of professional office space, a restaurant, coffee shop, and community gathering flex space—accessible by Boulder’s trails and public transportation network. When it was completed in 2017, it was the largest NZE building in Colorado and the first NZE multi-tenant mixed-use building.

Boulder Commons sets a new paradigm for net zero energy lease structures, alternative mobility and high performance speculative buildings. The form of the building itself is built to achieve net-zero energy. It creates a buffer for the rail lines to the east, a transition to the residential and mixed-use buildings to the west, and is optimized for solar and daylighting opportunities. Anchor tenant RMI—a leading global nonprofit organization focused on the clean energy transition—helped to create a first-of-its kind net-zero lease structure that helps align owners and tenants around energy saving goals.

Our Role
Studio NYL served as the structural engineers and supported building facade design.

Approach
Structurally, Studio NYL’s main priority was to manage the building’s structural integrity while maintaining the building’s height limit, while also looking at the structure for a complex underground parking structure.

The City of Boulder’s strict building code meant that the team had to find creative ways to integrate mechanical systems into the building’s structural steel beams in order to maximize ceiling heights (which is important for natural daylighting in a net-zero building) while minimizing the overall building height. This required a great deal of proactive coordination with the mechanical engineering and construction teams to closely coordinate duct runs through the beams in the most efficient locations.

On the facade, Studio NYL supported the systems design to integrate more than 575 kW of solar photovoltaic panels on the rooftop and on the east building facade in and around window openings.

“It was very rewarding to help make Boulder’s first net-zero office building possible. The building’s energy leadership is incredibly visible with PV panels on the roof and east facade. It sends a powerful message to the community that this is the future of sustainable design.”

— Julian Lineham