The Media-ICT by Cloud 9 is almost a Net-Zero Building

By: Lidija Grozdanic | July - 25 - 2011

The soon to be opened Media-ICT building is a project by Cloud 9, the studio founded by Enric Ruiz-Geli. In 2005, the studio won the public competition organized by the Barcelona Zona Franca Consortium and the 22@ District to design a home for the TIC (Information and Communication Technologies) community. This new facility is intended to act as a point of contact between media companies and institutions.
Each façade of the Media-ICT is different, maximizing their efficiency by taking into account their orientation with respect to the sun. The decision was taken to cover the south glass wall with a double skin, or membrane, of EFTE (ethylene tetrafluoro ethylene), a material that is light and elastic but so strong that a small surface can support the weight of a Land Rover. In total, there are 106 membranes or pillows of EFTE, silvery-blue in color, which will slowly inflate, or deflate depending on the climatic conditions. Each ‘pillow’ is controlled separately, with individual sensors measuring heat, temperature and the angle of the sun. On the side of the building that faces the headquarters of the CAC (the Audiovisual Council of Catalonia), currently under construction, there will be just one large pillow of EFTE, but in this case it will be filled with a vertical cloud of nitrogen particles: the resulting density of the air will be used to create a solar filter to protect the interior of the building.
At night, and without consuming any electricity, the façade will glow since the metal components have been coated with luminescent paint that ‘charges’ during the day to then give off light during the hours of darkness.