Temasek Polytechnic unveils centre that focuses on sustainable building operations

SINGAPORE - A few months after starting work, architectural assistant Sara Tan, 23, went back to her alma mater, Temasek Polytechnic (TP), to pick up software skills.

She has been training at the Integrative Built Environment Centre (IBEC), which is a new facility dedicated to her field of study. The centre was launched by Second Minister for Education Maliki Osman on Friday (Jan 7).

The centre, housed in TP's campus in Tampines, puts together various systems and machinery common in buildings here to give students a hands-on look at operating buildings sustainably.

These include a chiller system, lift and escalator set-ups, security processes which use artificial intelligence and an electric vehicle laboratory.

It will be used by around 1,000 full-time and about 1,000 continuing education students in various fields such as sustainable facility management and fire safety.

Dr Adrian Ang, senior manager at IBEC,  told the media at the launch that the facility, whose construction began in 2019, would make a world of difference to learning.

He said: "Before this facility, our students had to learn everything from the textbook in a classroom setting.

"This means that they were not able to see for themselves how certain problems or solutions play out in real life, which limits their understanding because they would just accept the theoretical calculations rather than be prompted to ask further questions and experiment."

Ms Tan, who graduated from TP in 2021 with a diploma in green building and sustainability, told The Straits Times that her first thought on using the facility was how comprehensive its features are.

She said: "It really puts everything (the different systems) together, which helps us understand the whole journey of how a building develops, as opposed to being taught the different components separately in a classroom."