Yes, it has become a dogma that about 30 - 40% of carbon-dioxide emissions is caused by buildings: it is the sum of erection, maintenance and demolition. In fact, the precise CO2 calculation of an individual building isn't easy - too many factors influence the total CO2 emission: building life cycle, wall heat conductance, geographic location, ventilation, energy sources, building materials and more. Usually architect's don’t have that expert knowledge. Why not a suggest a simple approach? How much CO2 is produced when making one cubic meters of concrete / steel / wood / brick? Of course it make a great difference. Beginning with concrete: 385 kg CO2/m³, steel: 12,200 kg CO2/m³, brick: 375 kg CO2 /m³ and wood - as a material with can bind CO2 - has got a negative total of minus 900 kg CO2 /m² (source: GEMIS)
February 12, 2008
CO2 Architecture.
by
Christoph ,anarchitecture
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9 comment(s):
Very interesting, and illuminating. For clarity though, when you say steel has a value of 12.200 kg CO2/m3, do you mean 12.200 or 12,200 ? twelve point two, or twelve thousand two hundred? (if you mean the latter it should be written with a comma, in English anyway! maybe its different in Austrian!)
Thanks for the feedback. You're right with the comma - we do it differently in Austria. So it should be 12,200.
Yes,but a wood frame house that is 100 years old is almost always a pile of junk and ready for the scrap heap[I know becauase I do alot of remodeling]A concrete building can last for hundreds of years.Also ask any firefighter a wood house burns much better than a concrete one!
churst:
actually wood [heavy timber] has a higher resistance to failure [from fire] than steel does. the japanese used that construction method for so many centuries because of that fact. modern day lumber [stick frame] is another story however...
regarding the concrete and steel: with the rate of construction [dubai!, china!] and especially demolition of old concrete and steel buildings [from the 60's=less than 50 years, las vegas!], the amount of waste and CO2 could easily outweigh the potential permanence of concrete and steel.
wood is renewable, recyclable, and has great plasticity [re: earthquakes]. all it needs is a little maintenance now and then. by the time a wood house needs new parts, you could grow that amount of wood by then.
excellent post!
also: the only way the concrete and steel structures could last for 100 years is to design them to be flexible and reusable for future programs.
were there any studies of buildings made of earth, the most widely used building material on the planet?
see:
http://www.eartharchitecture.org
no need for the "coma", notice that its CO2/m3, that means its expressed in the metric system, hence no coma but a "dot", you americans and your imperial system!...time to change!..hehehe j/k
Dubai has very limited timber stocks (being a desert) and readily available materials for concrete (being a desert). If Dubai was to use timber framed construction then the CO2 emissions from providing the plants desalinated water may outweigh any CO2 benefits from using timber. Based on the options provided, CO2 emissions will continue being released in Dubai. To prevent emissions construction should be stopped in Dubai, but how?
1. stop population growth
2. stop wars that displace people causing them to live in places like Dubai.
3. stop economic growth
None of these are architectural solutions.
Architects generally attribute too much belief that the built environment can solve human the problems. Utopian housing estates and their subsequent criticisms are the perfect example. I'm all for better building practices, but let's not fall into the same arrogance trap again. Green design is a band aid solution to the underlying gapping wound of population and economic growth.
(sorry people, this is going to be a novel)
drue,
It is more or less accepted that modernist architects thought space planning, aesthetics and other design issues could produce utopian conditions to solve social ills. It is also accepted that their idealism was largely a failure. We all saw the Pruitt-Igoe slide in architectural history/theory class. However, I think you are confusing some very real ethical problems faced by today's architects with modernist idealism.
Do you accept the following premises about 20th century architecture through the present? (I believe they are true for the vast majority of built work. There are exceptions, but I believe these represent the rule):
1) The longevity of buildings and building materials is rarely considered by clients except for calculating the time of repayment on investment. (Will my rent pay off the building before it falls apart?)
2) Building materials and construction methods are primarily chosen from within a range of aesthetic parameters by their cost of installation and maintenance. (Okay all these options you have presented me are fine. Build the most cheap option.)
3) To date, capitalism has failed to identify market forces or integrate price controls which reflect environmental impact. (There has been no price tag for bad environmental behavior, so there has also been no incentive for clients to clean up their act.)
4) Architects are in a position to sway clients in favor of one building material strategy over others. There are instances when architects can exercise their design skills to create an opportunity using alternative materials, construction methods and the like, often lessening the environmental impact of the final building.
5) Architects who do distinguish themselves as being particularly resourceful (along the lines of premise 4) will endear themselves to clients. Their clients will have buildings that outperform and outlast their "business as usual" counterparts.
6) Global warming is a real, pertinent threat to the stability of our industrialized civilization. Sustainability is necessary for the continued development of civilization as we know it. (You have to accept this, or the other premises mean nothing.)
Take the Dubai scenario, for instance. Why do you jump to the conclusion that the sole option is for construction in Dubai must be stopped? Instead, consider the origins of carbon emissions in the production of concrete. The mixture of ingredients which becomes cement must be heated at extremely high temperatures over very long periods of time to produce a chemical reaction. This is done in a long tube kiln which is generally fired with natural gas. So the burning of hydrocarbons in a fossil fuel (non-renewable) is what releases all that CO2 into the atmosphere. Why not design a solar kiln instead? One that focuses solar radiation (which Dubai has in gross excess) to produce extreme temperatures. The only way such a thing will get built is if architects start specifying concrete produced with "solar cement" from ready-mix suppliers.
I don't believe this has anything to do with the utopianism of the moderns. It has everything to do with defining our ethics as professionals and making decisions which reflect those ethics.
(Sorry the post was so long, but I felt it had to be said.)
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