Intelligent Workplace

The Center for Building Performance and Diagnostics (CBPD) is a demonstration project of the Advanced Building Systems Integration Consortium, a university-industry partnership established in July 1988 by Carnegie Mellon. There are nine major industry members in the Consortium, representing a dozen major building product areas. The intent of the Consortium is to have representation of all major building component/assemblies to manage the development of compatible technologies towards high performance workplaces. The CBPD was built as a rooftop addition to CMU's Margaret Morrison Carnegie Hall and as a result has been dubbed the "Intelligent Workplace."

The objectives of the CBPD are to advance student and professional education about thermal, air quality, visual, acoustic, and spatial performance as well as long term building integrity. Thus the CBPD provides a living and lived-in laboratory for testing new innovative products while demonstrating major changes in the advanced workplace.

The Intelligent Workplace houses faculty and graduate student offices, learning/resource labs, and conference facilities. Its own construction demonstrates innovative and high performance assemblies in its enclosure, mechanical/electrical systems, telecommunications systems, interior finishes, and furnishings. The learning labs provide students and professionals hands-on learning about thermal performance, air quality, spatial performance, building integrity, visual performance, and acoustic performance. Systems for monitoring a variety of performance parameters are an integral part of the CBPD's function as a test bed for new building technologies and their mutual interaction.

The 7,000 square foot penthouse addition was a joint project of Bohlin Cywinski Jackson and Swiss architect Pierre Zoelly working with the professional staff of CMU's Center for Building Performance and Diagnostics.