BETA Technologies Manufacturing and Assembly Facility

This new, 188,500-square-foot high-bay facility located directly adjacent to the Patrick Leahy Burlington International Airport runways includes aircraft manufacture and assembly space and approximately 25,000 square feet of open office and support space with windows overlooking both the manufacturing space and the tarmac. As the first phase of BETA’s campus expansion, the project supports the manufacturing and assembly of the electric aerospace company’s battery-powered aircraft and electric charging infrastructure.

In keeping with BETA’s mission of sustainability, the entire facility is nearly net-zero and utilizes a mix of renewable energy sources, including a 2.2-acre solar array along with 257 geothermal wells to provide the primary heating and cooling. No fossil fuels are used in the operation of the building and it is estimated that it will consume half the energy of a typical building of this size that meets baseline ASHRAE standards. Other sustainable features include daylighting, high efficiency lights that mimic the behavior of the sun, natural ventilation, grey water reclamation drawn from a 40,000-gallon rainwater tank, stormwater management and electric vehicle charging stations.

To meet its operational goals, the facility utilizes a high-performance exterior building envelope assembly consisting of four-inch-thick insulated metal panels, a white TPO roof to reflect the sun and address heat island effect, and triple-glazed windows. Looking up from the center of the manufacturing floor is a 40-foot-wide by 400-foot-long skylight made of a proprietary Kalwall product that filters UV light and reduces glare. The building’s under-slab insulation uses ultra-lightweight foamed glass aggregate (99% recycled glass) in lieu of extruded polystyrene rigid foam insulation, which offers a more sustainable and efficient insulation system.

PC identified early in construction that the lead time for traditional joists was too long and that supply was nearly impossible to obtain. As a result, PC brought in experts from Lainco, Inc. and created a unique design-build contract to creatively engineer the building’s structure with its proprietary truss system. The resulting system included 10-foot-tall trusses and a clear span of 170 feet at the center of the facility. And, mid-construction, when the steel for the superstructure was in the middle of fabrication and had started to arrive onsite, a major change was made to add a 25,000-square-foot third level. This change required a substantial redesign to the foundation plan and steel to accommodate the additional building load.

Construction occurred in close proximity to Burlington International Airport and less than 250 feet from the runway, requiring compliance with FAA permit conditions and restrictions. In addition, the tight site required extensive 3D sequence planning and subcontractor coordination to ease congestion.

PC completed the facility on a drastically accelerated timeline. The project progressed from a brownfield site to a 188,500-square-foot fully functioning facility in just 2.5 years, which included six months for early design packages and six months for permitting. Supporting that effort was extensive and collaborative preconstruction, including multiple GMPs, design-assist support and flexibility in meeting scope changes for this unique and complex facility.

LAINCO, the LAINCO logo, HIGHRIDGE SYSTEMS, and the group of each main truss and associated secondary beams are trademarks of Lainco Inc. used under license and constitutes an architectural work protected by copyright © 2011 Lainco Inc.