Skip to main content
Add as a preferred source on Google


U Iowa Grows a Green Roof

  • By Dian Schaffhauser
  • 09/02/14
U Iowa Grows a Green Roof

The University of Iowa recently opened its new $126 million interdisciplinary biomedical research center, which sports what it claims is a first for the state: a green roof. The 6,440 square-feet of rooftop on the Pappajohn Biomedical Discovery Building will feature soil six inches deep with green plantings. This rooftop greenery is intended to reduce rainfall runoff, filter water, reduce energy used on the interior for heating and cooling and prolong the life of the roofing materials. Runoff reduction is particularly important to the university, which lost several structures in a 2008 flood.

The facility, which is pursuing gold LEED certification, will include multiple microclimates to accommodate a variety of plantings, according to coverage in the Daily Iowan. Also, because portions of the roof can be seen from many of the building's offices, the green will provide a visual break for occupants.

Among the operations in the center will be six floors of research labs and a mix of wet and dry labs. Among the major areas of research will be diabetes, cardiovascular, auditory, lung biology and biomedical imaging. One level will contain the Iowa Institute for Biomedical Imaging, with several MRIs.

The pre-grown plantings come from Roof Top Sedums, an Iowa company that has also provided the greenery for a roof at the University of Missouri Patient Care Tower, a Kansas State University roof, and a roof at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln.

U Iowa will be growing an ever bigger rooftop garden system as part of the construction for a new art building, replacing one damaged in the flood. That building is expected to be opened in May 2016.

About the Author

Dian Schaffhauser is a former senior contributing editor for 1105 Media's education publications THE Journal, Campus Technology and Spaces4Learning.

Featured

  • stylized illustration of people conversing on headsets

    AI and Our Next Conversations in Higher Education

    Ryan Lufkin, the vice president of global strategy for Instructure, examines how the focus on AI in education will move from experimentation to accountability.

  • AI word on microchip and colorful light spread

    Microsoft Unveils Maia 200 Inference Chip to Cut AI Serving Costs

    Microsoft recently introduced Maia 200, a custom-built accelerator aimed at lowering the cost of running artificial intelligence workloads at cloud scale, as major providers look to curb soaring inference expenses and lessen dependence on Nvidia graphics processors.

  • large group of college students sitting on an academic quad

    Student Readiness: Learning to Learn

    Melissa Loble, Instructure's chief academic officer, recommends a focus on 'readiness' as a broader concept as we try to understand how to build meaningful education experiences that can form a bridge from the university to the workplace. Here, we ask Loble what readiness is and how to offer students the ability to 'learn to learn'.

  • Blue metallic mesh fabric folds

    Microsoft Acquires Osmos for Agentic AI Data Engineering

    In a strategic move to reduce time-consuming manual data preparation, Microsoft has acquired Seattle-based startup Osmos, specializing in agentic AI for data engineering.