Sustainable architecture with digital construction technology
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Ecological and sustainable building is not a distant utopia, but a necessity. The possibilities offered by new methods in architecture and construction technology to come closer to this goal must be urgently tested in view of the great need for new living space.
"The construction industry is responsible for more than 40 per cent of CO2 emissions worldwide - compared to only two to three per cent for air traffic," explains Moritz Dörstelmann, Professor at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology. Together with an international and interdisciplinary team, the architect is digitally rethinking the historic craft.
"One of our demonstrator projects consists of a hybrid load-bearing structure made of wood in combination with ceiling components made of a willow-clay composite. The façade is made of flax fibres," explains Dörstelmann. "This allowed us to constructively utilise an intelligent mix of local, rapidly renewable materials as well as earth and wood." The scalable use of these natural building materials in high-performance components is made possible by digital construction technologies.
The researchers are also investigating what the material flow could look like when using willows as a building material. They are pursuing the approach of rewetting dry moorland and cultivating willows there. "Both the rewetted moors and the fast-growing willows store large amounts of CO2," explains Dörstelmann. "In this way, we can process local materials with low energy consumption and, above all, diversify the use of renewable raw materials in the construction industry."
Dörstelmann actively involves his students in all phases of the project. "We open the funnel for new ideas very wide at the beginning in order to take a really unbiased and unfiltered look at what new circular digital construction methods could look like.
Conclusion: New methods need a broad horizon in development so that possibilities can develop that will eventually become reality.
(Photo: © Karlsruhe Institute of Technology KIT)