A Partnership For The Oceans

For many years, Nova Southeastern University has enjoyed an excellent working relationship with Guy Harvey, Ph.D., through the NSU Guy Harvey Research Institute, where researchers and students work together as they study and learn about all aspects of our marine ecosystem. To honor this partnership, NSU named the newest research building on its Oceanographic campus the Nova Southeastern University Guy Harvey Oceanographic Research Center in 2012. Along with Harvey’s signature on the side of the facility, his name also adorns the roof of the building.

While most people recognize Harvey as a marine wildlife artist, not many are aware that he earned a Ph.D. in fisheries biology. This love of the marine world, his desire to learn more about our ocean-bound neighbors, and his mission to provide direction and assistance in the protection and conservation of these creatures led to the formation of the NSU Guy Harvey Research Institute in 1999.

Learn More About Guy Harvey

The NSU Guy Harvey Oceanographic Research Center is an environmentally friendly, state of the art building with 86,000 square feet of usable space. The building is silver LEED certified. The activities in this research building are multi-disciplinary to address national and international priorities in coral reef research in five thematic areas:

  • Impacts of global and local stressors
  • geospatial analysis and mapping
  • deep sea coral reefs and organisms
  • genetic and genomic connectivity
  • hydrodynamics

The center includes space for offices, research laboratories, collaboration, research training, and fieldwork staging. Laboratories are equipped with the latest technology for mapping and geospatial analysis, microbiology, genetics and genomics, histology, geology, ecological modeling, deep sea optical and vision, ichthyology, coral reef assessment, monitoring, and restoration, and wet laboratories for seawater usage and organism maintenance. The building houses a research library for the many disciplines of marine science, an auditorium, seminar rooms, a seawater purification and delivery system, and an outside experimentation facility. The facilities also include a SCUBA gear storage area and tank fill station for regular air and nitrox.

The Facility

Opened: September 2012

Size: 87,000 square feet (5 stories)

Location: Within Dr. Von D. Mizell-Eula Johnson State Park, Florida at the entrance to the Port Everglades

NSU’s Guy Harvey Oceanographic Research Center was awarded LEED® Silver Certification by the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC). This is the foremost program for buildings, homes and communities that are designed, constructed, maintained and operated for improved environmental and human health performance.

The facility also won the Best Overall Project Award given by the Design-Build Institute of America’s (DBIA) Florida region. The 87,000-square foot research facility was chosen among other elite competitors, such as LEGOLAND Florida. The award was presented to NSU and its design/builder (Moss and Miller, LLC), and their design/build team, which included (Cannon Design, Acai Associates and Bliss & Nyitray, Inc.) during the 7th Annual Conference of the DBIA’s Florida Region.

$50 million—NSU received a $15 million competitive grant from the U.S. Department of Commerce (using funding from the American Recovery Reinvestment Act of 2009) to build the center, while the university funded the balance of the project.

Facility Labs

The NSU Guy Harvey Oceanographic Research Center houses multiple labs, each with a different research focus, led by NSU’s world-class faculty. Learn more about each:

Facility Sustainability Features

The facility’s envelope (roof, walls and glazing,) illumination, and space conditioning systems (water and landscaping) make the building “sustainable” by minimizing the amount of natural resources used to deliver the services to run the building. Energy costs and environmental impact are, therefore, reduced.

Roof System

The room systems are energy efficient with the use of a high-albedo roof coating with a solar reflectance index of 98. The roof color (white) was selected to minimize the “heat island effect,” greatly reducing the amount of the sun’s heat absorbed into the facility.

Window System

Multiple types of highly reflective, low E exterior glazing with a solar heat gain coefficient of .33 - .40 were selected to reduce heat gain in the variety of interior spaces. By reducing heat gain throughout the exterior glazing system, the building’s mechanical equipment size was reduced significantly therefore, saving energy costs.  

Wall System

The building is oriented east-west along its long axis, therefore minimizing exposure on the east and west ends of the facility. The south facing walls have reduced glass to wall ratios, which minimizes heat gain and makes the building envelope more efficient. The north facing walls have more glazing area to make use of natural day light. The exterior wall systems were designed to exceed the Florida Building Code standard for hurricane resistance. All exterior materials meet the Miami-Dade County Notice of Acceptance requirements.

The air conditioning system is energy efficient via the Building Automation System (BAS,) which controls its operation. The system is designed to provide maximum controllability of thermal comfort with individual thermostats for each area. The Thermal Energy Storage system reduces energy use and costs by providing chilled water to the mechanical system at night.
In order to preserve the potable drinking water, rainwater is collected from the roof and is stored in a 1,000 gallon tank in the mechanical room. This water is piped to the exterior of the building and is used to rinse off the SCUBA equipment when the researchers return from diving.

A key component of the facility is the seawater retrieval, purification and distribution system throughout the building and the exterior experimental area. Seawater is collected from two wells on site and then brought to holding tanks on the ground floor for processing. The seawater is run through multiple batch processing sequences to remove all harmful chemicals and compounds before distribution.

A dedicated piping system is used throughout the facility to ensure that the seawater does not get contaminated during use and processing. After it has been used, the seawater is discharged back into a well on site.

The lighting system throughout the facility takes advantage of occupancy sensors to control when lights are on, thus reducing energy use significantly. In addition, LED and TS lamps were used to reduce the lighting energy use of the facility below 1 watt per square foot.
This process uses natural daylight to illuminate offices and spaces by windows, minimizing the amount of lighting provided by electrically powered lighting systems. Daylight harvesting uses daylight sensors to automatically dim and brighten lights within each space, depending on the amount of outside light registered.

Solar Thermal Panels

The solar water heating system allows use of renewable energy to heat the water used throughout the facility and minimizes the use of electrical energy to heat water. This reduces the energy use for generating hat water by 25%.

Solar Photovoltaic Panels

A photovoltaic array located on site captures energy from the sun and introduces this power back into the power grid. This amount of energy captured is equivalent to the power required for the site lighting for sidewalks, driveways and parking lots – approximately 22.86 megawatts per year.

Low Flow Plumbing

Efficient water fixtures also add to the sustainability portfolio of the building by providing adequate water flow without waste. Fixtures include: 1.28 gallon per flush toilets; 0.125 gallon per flush urinals; and 1.5 gallons per cycle shower heads. These fixtures contribute to a 32% water use reduction.

Landscaping

Plant selections minimize the resource inputs in terms of water for irrigation with the use of native plants. Native and adaptive drought-tolerant and wind-resistant plants were selected for their ability to survive the costal ecosystem, reducing the need for supplemental watering and fertilization.

Irrigation

The irrigation system was designed for longevity and sustainability by integrating a low-flow drip line, efficient rotary heads and by leaving a portion of the site not irrigated. The weather-based controller, rain sensor and soil moisture sensor conserve water by monitoring actual local weather, the moisture present in the site soil and by adjusting the irrigation schedule to the plants’ specific watering needs. This system is designed to reduce potable water use for irrigation by nearly 70%.

Supporting Institutes

What Beats a School by the Ocean? A School in the Ocean

Map and Directions

8000 North Ocean Drive
Dania Beach, FL 33004-3078
1-800-39-OCEAN
imcs@nsu.nova.edu

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