Medite Smartply Invests in the Future of Environmentally Conscious Buildings with Donation to TU Dublin
MEDITE SMARTPLY has announced a donation of 250,000 to TU Dublin to support the development of Design + Construct, a centre for collaborative, multidisciplinary education that will drive performance in the Architecture, Engineering and Construction (AEC) sector through talent and technology.
As part of the Design + Construct facility, the SMARTPLY Hub will promote sustainable design and production processes and provide opportunities for innovation through applied and project-based learning. The facility will also offer research facilities critical to the next generation of AEC graduates in technologies such as off-site and modular construction, near-zero energy building, and robotic construction.
Holly Waters-Marsh, Head of Marketing for Medite Smartply, said
The aim of our involvement with TU Dublin is to align to support the challenges from reducing embodied carbon within the built environment, the new homes proposed under the National Development Plan and retrofitting the existing housing stock- all dimensions which touch our business. The off-site sector is key for us as we recognise that increasing the number of timber frame constructions and the use of engineered wood will play an important role in this
According to Orna Hanly, Head of the Design + Construct Project at TU Dublin, the centre is a new way of teaching for the AEC sector, requiring a new type of space.
With the support of our partners such as MEDITE SMARTPLY, TU Dublin will deliver a flexible, adaptable facility that can be changed and altered to meet the educational and research needs of our students. The building will be a 'living' AEC laboratory, an exemplar for the sector encompassing best practices in sustainable design and construction
Minister for Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science Simon Harris recently gave the go-ahead to proceed to the next phase of the project proposal development, which envisages the refurbishment of a building in TU Dublin’s satellite facility in Broombridge for core academic space to address capacity.