SAN FRANCISCO—After almost a decade of planning and building, the renovated California Academy of Sciences is scheduled to open its doors to the public on Saturday, Sept. 27.
The long-anticipated museum shows its dedication to sustainable technologies by harnessing energy from sunlight and ocean tides.
“The message and the mission of the institution is to preserve the natural origins of life and the unbelievable diversity of life,” said Dr. Greg Farrington, the museum’s Executive Director during a preview of the facility. “It’s all about these two important topics of our time—the nature of life and how we, as humans, are going to find a way to stay.”
The Academy aspires to earn the country's highest Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design rating of platinum, according to its website.
With renewable sources of energy in mind, Italian-born architect Renzo Piano utilized recycled building materials, replaced concrete walls with glass ensuring enough natural light in the building, and placed 60,000 photovoltaic cells around a 2.5 acre garden rooftop—among the largest in the world.
“It is like lifting a piece of the park and putting a building under it," said the architect about the living rooftop environment, which rises 40 feet in the air, naturally insulating the building from weather changes, and recycling water from rainfall.
A goal of the museum is to serve as a reminder of the constantly growing human population and peoples’ contribution to the global climate change. The museum takes “a complex issue and makes it approachable and understandable for people,” says Dr. Carol Tang of the Academy.
Upon entering the museum, one will notice rays of sunshine peering through the rectangular glass roof supported by undulating, spider-web-like metal truss, assembled in a way that provides both strength and aesthetic value. Towering, four-story living rainforests enclosed in a glass dome next to a beach with running water beckons visitors. Inside the tropical dome, the temperature is always 83 to 85 degrees Fahrenheit, contrasting the generally cool and windy San Francisco outside.
The California Academy of Sciences also boasts a very atmospheric and diverse underground aquarium, complete with a beach and sea grass at the surface. Underneath, however, lives the largest indoor coral reef in the world, housing over 2,000 different fish.
Moreover, the aquarium also has simulated tide-pools and a glimpse of what it’s like in underwater coastal California, complete with an octopus and a giant sea bass. Moving back to the surface, there is also a swamp with an albino alligator basking in it.
The three sloping hills on the museum’s roof are the tops of the planetarium, aquarium, and rainforest dome.
It’s covered in 1,700,000 native plants in over 50,000 coconut-husk trays. They will help capture up to 90 percent of the water from rain instead of letting it run off into the ocean, saving around 3.5 million gallons of fresh water yearly, according to Senior Curator of Botany, Frank Almeda.
The academy kept many of the old favorites, such as the African Hall dioramas featuring taxidermic animals that have graced the museum since 1934. It has also added a live African penguins habitat.
Finally, in the Planetarium, a 180-degree projection screen simulates travel throughout the Solar system and beyond.
The new Academy of Sciences building incorporates the Steinhart Aquarium, the Morrison Planetarium, and the Kimball Natural History Museum under one living roof. Although the academy will offer admission free days, price to visit is $25 dollars for adults, $20 for youths, seniors and students, and $15 for children.
Features
l Large 75-foot in diameter, 300 seat planetarium, with hourly showings
l Rainforest section has a cave which separately houses bats, snakes, and scorpions
l 212,000 gallon coral reef tank
l More than 20 million natural history specimens
l Live penguins in the New African Hall
l Rainforest is 65-feet tall
l Fund-raisers obtained $488 million to build the new facility
Visit the website at: http://www.calacademy.org/
