Skip to Content
Sunny daytime exterior view of 2,100 square metre two storey BC Hydro Operations Centre in Port Alberni showing wood exterior, including office area with a roof of braced, steel frame supporting glue-laminated timber (glulam) beams on the main column lines

BC Hydro Operations Facility – Maple Ridge

Location: Maple Ridge, B.C.
Architect: Omicron
Completion: 2012
Photo credit: Terry Guscott

Size
2,322 square metres

Engineered Wood Fabricator
StructureCraft

Owner
BC Hydro

Project Materials
Glue-laminated timber (Glulam)
Millwork
Siding
Solid-sawn heavy timber

Structural Systems
Hybrid / Other
Passive House / High performance
Post + beam
Prefabricated

Wood features prominently as a cost-conscious, strong and durable solution

The residents of rapidly growing Maple Ridge, a suburban municipality on the eastern edge of Metro Vancouver, had electrical needs that could only be met with a new BC Hydro facility. BC Hydro, British Columbia’s (B.C.’s) electrical utility (external link), commissioned the building as a base for the crews in the area who provide operations and maintenance that could also serve as a post-disaster operations centre after a major seismic event.

The building’s program

BC Hydro’s Maple Ridge facility program is divided almost equally between administrative and light industrial uses. The office areas provide open workspaces for staff, and the industrial areas include vehicle bays, workshops, drying rooms and warehouse/storage spaces.

Operations centres generally require large and flexible yard areas where materials and equipment can be stored and accessed easily by work crews, a particular challenge in this case because of the development setbacks and riparian enhancement requirements related to two adjacent streams.

Exposed composite trusses are a central feature

The wood fabricator and installer helped develop the high-performance, LEED-certified building. The high bay, or tall ceiling, industrial areas are clear spanned. A series of bow-shaped trusses are the supports, made from curved glue-laminated timber (glulam) top chord (the top part of the truss) and steel tensile components. Some of the curved glulam beams are exposed on the exterior of the building, used as landscape trellis frames and/or shading elements. The exterior is clad in wood siding, giving a stylish look to what is traditionally considered a highly utilitarian structure.

In addition to meeting these regulatory requirements, the client and design team further minimized the environmental impacts of the building by incorporating energy and water conservation elements and durable, non-toxic, low embodied energy materials, all of which earned the facility a LEED Gold rating.

This facility is a companion project to a previously completed operations centre in Port Alberni, B.C.

Opens in new tab