Construction waste is a pressing issue in today's world. Rapid urbanization and population growth have resulted in increased consumption of building materials. In 2018 The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) estimated that only in the U.S. 600 million tons of construction and demolition waste were generated, which is estimated to be nearly a quarter of the waste stream generated from all industries.
Construction waste not only occupies land, it also pollutes the environment, affects water, soil and air quality. For example, if we take wood - the most natural material that you can think of, when it decomposes in a landfill it generates emissions of carbon dioxide and methane causing additional pollution to the air.
Current building practices use a lot of materials and resources but in an ineffective way that is based on a linear model in which profit maximization is central. The traditional demolition process completely destroys structures and at the end of the life of the building just landfills the debris. Rather than demolishing an entire building, it is much more beneficial to deconstruct it piece by piece in order to preserve construction materials for future reuse.
In LA a large number of buildings were built in the 20s-30s-40s of the 20th century and were made out of original old-growth pine and fir. Can you imagine your house made out of a 300-year-old tree? The material value of such structures is incredible! But if these buildings are demolished and all that is left of them is going to a landfill - then all their value is lost.
But what if we change our attitude toward materials and their use?
What if we start thinking of all buildings as material depots, full of reusable resources for future projects?
What if we stop demolishing and start building new buildings from materials that are already available in the form of other buildings?
In order to do that there should be a fundamental shift in our attitude toward materials and their use in general.There is a need for an integrated approach that would take into account multiple levels of a problem: its stakeholders, potential socioeconomic and environmental impacts as well as various methods of action.
A part of that approach is the implementation of principles of a circular economy, where most of the building materials are reused as many times as possible, which will help to prevent the depletion of the Earth's resources, will generate new job opportunities, provide cheaper materials and will minimize pollution.
The team came up with an idea to create a pilot project that would analyze an existing building in terms of the value of its materials. This information would be organized into a construction materials database that we would use to generate a concept of an Educational Pavilion for the UCLA Campus.
We analyzed a common for LA 2-storey wood-frame residential buildings built in 1941.
The greatest part about this type of building is the fact that back then when it was constructed they used original old-growth wood which has much better quality than today’s lumber. That's why it was so important for us to find appropriate reuse for such great material.
First, we've created a 3D model of our building structure to analyze all its elements, based on their type and dimensions.
Second, we created a chart where we subdivided all elements that we`ve indicated according to their current use and future use in the Pavillion. That gave us an understanding of the number of elements needed for a project and the amount that would be left.
Pavillion made out of reused wood.
It is an open-air but shaded structure that proudly displays its material - the wood is left uncovered and unpainted. The pavilion is 16 by 16 feet square and slopes in height from 16 to 10 feet. It is intended to serve as a public attractor for sustainability-related educational purposes.
The elements we`ve reused in our pavilion were: 2in x 10in x 16feet members that were used as wall, floor and ceiling structural elements, 2 in x 8 in x 10 feet members that we used for flooring, steps and bracing elements; and 2 in x 4 in x 8 ft members as main ceiling elements.
We intended the pavilion to be a place where students and the general public can come to view installations on the topic of sustainability while also relaxing, feeling the light penetrating through the ceiling and warm sand under their feet.
The life-cycle of the materials used could be further extended by reuse such as Flooring, furniture and Fencing.
