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Sustainable Design Strategies
for the Modernization of the Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station
by Joseph J. Ferraro, AIA and William D. Brooks, AIA
6. Ensuring a Station Useful Life of 25 Years or More
Historically, the greatest challenge to achieving sustainable facilities at Amundsen-Scott has been contending with annual snow deposition and drifting. All conventional structures built on-grade at the South Pole are covered by winter snowdrifts after only one or two seasons. The drifted structures are further buried by the typical annual snowfall of 0.2 - 0.3 meters. As there is no thaw cycle at the Pole, they eventually become too deeply buried to practically excavate and access. Eventually, the buried structures deform under the ever-increasing weight of the snow, and must be abandoned.
The new design for the habitat portion of Amundsen-Scott has overcome this historical dilemma with an elevated, linear complex of two interconnected C-shaped buildings that are configured and oriented to control snow drifting.
 The snow drifting design evolved from a series of predictive studies at the Canadian based research facility of Rowan Williams Davies & Irwin (RWDI), including water flume and wind tunnel testing, Computational Fluid Dynamics, and Finite Area Element computer modeling techniques. The studies verified that the two buildings, interconnected and elevated approximately 3 meters above the surface with long axis of the complex oriented perpendicular to the prevailing winter winds, would perform well. The windward face of each building and the interconnecting link is chamfered to smoothly channel the wind beneath the complex. Forced to accelerate, the wind carries the snow well past the buildings where it is deposited in long leeward drifts. A windward drift also forms just in front of the station as a result of momentary turbulence where the wind encounters the building face. Over time, the leeward and windward deposits will tend to accumulate around the ends of the station and connect into a rough crater shape. Eventually, the surrounding snow field will build to a height where it will prevent the wind from channeling beneath the station (See Figure 4).
To overcome the potential drifting at this point, the station is designed to be jackable, so that the entire complex can be raised approximately 4 meters (one floor level), and the cycle of effective drifting mitigation will resume. The duration of the initial cycle has been effectively increased by initially erecting the station on a compacted snow berm that is itself 2 meters higher than grade. Subsequent studies indicate that when all factors are considered, the station’s ability to control drifting could continue until the windward drift approaches the height of the building’s mid section. This prediction indicates that it may not be necessary to raise the building for well beyond 25 years.
Proceed to next section: 7. Energy Efficiency
Table of Contents
1. Abstract
2. Sustainable Design
3. Construction History at Amundsen-Scott Station
4. Sustainable Design Goals
5. Minimizing Impacts to the South Pole Research Environment
6. Ensuring a Station Useful Life of 25 Years or More
7. Energy Efficiency
8. Indoor Environmental Quality
9. Conclusion
10. References
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