When designing facades, various factors can influence their conception. From compositional, geographic, and environmental elements, facades incorporate a series of gestures that shape the building envelope, serving as the interface between the environment and life inside the building. In this context, contemporary architecture has sought to enrich the role of facades, maximizing their potential through technological innovation. Today, technology has been integrated to create a more textured and expressive architecture, explore diverse materialities, and promote circular and low-carbon architecture.
Understanding facades as the skin of buildings and recognizing the growing global demand for efficient use of resources in the built environment, there arises a need to harness the incidence of sunlight on building facades. In response, and considering an architectural environment closely linked to technology, Building Integrated Photovoltaics (BIPV) has gained even greater relevance in creating new aesthetics for facades and minimizing environmental impacts. These systems, with their technical capabilities and aesthetic qualities, result in attractive, durable, and resilient solar facades. They generate a positive impact on the built environment by seamlessly incorporating sustainable energy production into buildings.
BIPV technology represents a new path to tackle environmental harm while offering design freedom with its non-traditional characteristics. In addition, their applications in contemporary projects make this technology stand out, showcasing concepts that embrace the potential and qualities of innovative facade systems in architecture, such as SolarLab's.
Year-Round Energy Production
Solar power can be effective in every season, without the need for strong, direct sunlight year-round. The strategic placement of panels on facades, rather than rooftops, makes it possible to obtain energy even in regions with long winter periods and reduced solar incidence. This approach extends the efficiency of solar energy by adapting to varying climatic conditions, thus ensuring consistent performance throughout the year.
This concept is illustrated at Breidablikk Gården in Haugesund, Norway, where the facade panels on the east and west sides of the building are angled to the south to increase energy production and are placed to shade the offices. Additionally, the use of screen curtains reduces the need for cooling. The result is an appealing facade that, with the capacity to generate electricity, not only enhances exterior beauty but also serves as a prime example of how urban renewal can uplift a city while consistently delivering clean energy.
Creating a Livelier Facade
Additionally, the Breidablikk Gården office building features a customized rain-screen facade in various sizes and shapes. This choice contributed to a facade endowed with dynamism, especially noteworthy given the building's fundamental volume as a rectangular prism, prompting the project architect, Peter Feltendal, to comment that "Although the building is a square box, the result is much livelier." Moreover, the anisotropic colors (change of hue depending on the light's refraction) completely hid the high-efficiency PV technology behind the glare-free facade.
This solar facade solution, with its many shapes and tilted panels, fully leverages the design freedom afforded by the cladding system to create dynamic and appealing architecture, whose photovoltaic systems are resilient against partial shadowing, and ensure a long operational life, even in the harsh winters.
We worked with the variation in the SolarLab panels, which change color depending on the light's refraction in their coating. It is a way to play with the elements that the panels have in themselves. -Peter Feltendal, Project Architect
Minimal Maintenance and Climate Resistance
In addition to their distinctive aesthetics, solar facade panels are known for their durability and resilience. Recognizing the need for a facade to endure harsh weather conditions while preserving its structural integrity, these systems are designed to withstand challenging weather, adapt to local conditions, and are crafted with durable materials, making them resistant to extreme temperatures, wind pressures, and snow loads.
Furthermore, in terms of maintenance, solar facade panels require minimal upkeep, using sustainable energy for their production and incorporating 30-80% recycled materials, according to SolarLab. This dual emphasis on durability and environmental responsibility makes them a cost-effective and practical solution for a wide range of building typologies, whether in new constructions or retrofit projects.
Rigorous Testing
The testing of solar facade systems is essential to ensure their resilience. In this context, impact tests —which consist of dropping a 45 kg ball onto fully tempered glass— ensure that BIPV facade solutions can withstand collision without breaking or shattering. In addition, fire resistance tests are carried out, prioritizing safety and durability.
On the other hand, the customization of BIPV facade systems allows for specific approaches to be explored, facilitating the development of proposals that consider additional standards for specific projects. Through the implementation of prototypes and the development of samples, it is possible to generate alternatives that meet specific requirements.
Design With Sustainability in Mind
By integrating their qualities and prioritizing sustainable design, solar facades stand out for their durability and strength, showcasing a multi-generational lifespan. They are specifically engineered to enter a circular resource economy at the end of their operational life, using predominantly recycled materials and sustainable energy, which minimizes their environmental footprint.
This approach translates into a transformative and customizable building technology in terms of angle, orientation, and colors —that mimic a metallic or ceramic appearance— finish, texture, dimensions, and shape. It provides the design flexibility needed to be an alternative to traditional cladding with resilient and durable solutions, without compromising quality, architectural integrity, or aesthetics.
By leveraging technologies such as Building Integrated Photovoltaics (BIPV), the design of appealing and sustainable architecture can become easier, giving new purposes to facades. Recognizing the growing global demand for the efficient use of resources in the built environment, SolarLab capitalizes on sunlight incidence on building facades to enhance the overall benefits for the building. Furthermore, they help maintain a comprehensive focus on how individual project decisions can have positive impacts on the community.
To learn more about SolarLab and its solutions, visit their website or refer to the product catalog.
