This is a four-storey building with a roof level penthouse plant enclosure with a gross floor area of
approximately 6250m². The building has been designed as a hi-technology clinical and translational
research facility located within the grounds of the live University College Hospital, Galway. The structure consists of a precast reinforced concrete frame with a steelwork penthouse structure. This is in
accordance with sustainable design principles regarding material selection and off-site construction. The
Clinical Research Facility is accommodated on the ground and first floor with the Translational Research Laboratory on the second and third floors. The internal planning provides for open and flexible spaces to accommodate current and future modes of use. The project provided medical patient care facility and laboratory research areas along with consultant’s rooms.
The Civils design for the project included a sustainable (SUDS) design including:
- Attenuation storage and flow control.
- Permeable pavement and filtration through the granular base of the specified permeable pavements.
- Diversion of live services including water mains, power cables and medical gases.
- GGBS was used throughout in the concrete mix, thereby significantly reducing the CO2 volume per tonne of concrete.
Full, sustainable (SUDS) design was incorporated including:
- Rainwater Harvesting, attenuation storage and flow control, attenuation through the granular base of the specified permeable pavements, filtration through the granular medium incorporated into the attenuation storage device.
Services provided by BMCE:
- Full Civil / Structural Engineering Services in the context of public works contract.
- Preparation of Civil and Structural scheme proposals at pre-tender stage.
- Structural appraisals.
- Design of structural and civil engineering elements of the project, preparation of the planning package.
- Monitoring works on site.

Project: National University of Ireland Galway, Arts Hummanities and Social Science Research Building
Client: NUI Galway
Architect: Reddy Architecture and Urbanism
Category: Education / Design & Build Contract
Award: IEI Engineering Building of the Year Award 2013 Runner-up