“This research informs policies that will help plan, prepare for, and protect the future. After receiving the funding and the Government’s endorsement to proceed with the redevelopment in 2021, it’s fantastic to see progress on the ice already being made. The new long-term science building is a great step forward for the Scott Base Redevelopment.”
– Antarctica New Zealand Chief Executive, Sarah Williamson
Scott Base is New Zealand’s only Antarctic research station. In Budget 2021, Antarctica New Zealand secured $344 million of funding to redevelop Scott Base and upgrade the Ross Island Wind Farm. ACOR worked alongside Hugh Broughton Architects, WSP, Steensen Varming and Holmes Fire to design the new building for Antarctica New Zealand’s Scott Base Redevelopment Program. The redevelopment of Scott Base will replace the existing base with three interconnected buildings and upgrade the Ross Island wind farm providing a safe, fit-for-purpose and environmentally sustainable scientific research base. The new facility will be fitted with wet and dry laboratories, science workspaces, biosecurity facilities, event staging, and storage areas and can accommodate up to 100 people.
We designed the new long-term science building to endure the hostile Antarctic environment of extreme winds and cold polar temperatures. It is elevated to help manage snowdrift and will support several science experiments, some of which have continued uninterrupted since 1957 when Sir Edmund Hillary and his team set up Scott Base.
The redevelopment of Scott Base will replace the existing base with three interconnected buildings and upgrade the Ross Island wind farm. Our design will provide a safe, fit-for-purpose, environmentally sustainable scientific research base. Fitted with wet and dry laboratories, science workspaces, biosecurity facilities, event staging, and storage areas as well as an external deck for testing equipment or preparing samples for shipments and a roof deck for science, the redevelopment will support New Zealand’s presence in the Ross Sea region of Antarctica for the next 50 years.
The long term science building is the first part of the redevelopment to be constructed and we provided our Fire services expertise for this stage. For the next stages of the redevelopment, we are excited to be designing the Fire, Hydraulics, Fuel and Dangerous Goods on the project.
Once completed, Scott Base will provide a safe, fit-for- purpose, environmentally sustainable scientific research base. Scott Base looks out towards Black and White Islands and sits under an annually occurring ozone hole. It is one of only three sites in the world that houses a radio receiver (nicknamed ChlOE) which is tuned to receive a key compound in the destruction of ozone – chlorine monoxide.
The new base can accommodate up to 100 people and will consist of an accommodation, dining and welfare building, a science and management building, and an engineering and storage building. Alongside this, the base will provide data logging support and power to a number of other experiments in the area, including a weather station, seismic experiment, geophysical monitoring using Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS), and the AARDDVARK experiment which measures space weather.
The new base is designed to facilitate world-leading science and better support local and deep-field science with improved efficiencies.
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