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Thin-shell textile-reinforced concrete floors for sustainable buildings

Accepted version
Peer-reviewed

Type

Conference Object

Change log

Authors

Shepherd, Paul 
Bregulla, Julie 

Abstract

Steel-reinforced concrete, cast in flat prismatic forms, dominates multi-storey building construction around the world. Despite the fluidity of the material, opportunities to create efficient geometries through manipulation of form are habitually overlooked, resulting in inefficient cracked sections, high steel requirements and large carbon footprints. This project brings together modern developments in computational design, materials and construction to propose a novel thin-shell concrete flooring system for multi-storey buildings, creating a low embodied energy and lightweight alternative to traditional reinforced concrete flat slabs. In this investigation, the performance of various shell geometries are compared using finite element analysis. A functional design is produced and found to offer reductions of 62% in embodied energy and 64% in weight compared to an equivalent flat slab.

Description

Keywords

Journal Title

IASS 2017 - Interfaces: architecture. engineering. science Proceedings

Conference Name

IASS 2017 - Interfaces: architecture. engineering. science

Journal ISSN

Volume Title

Publisher

The International Association of Shell and Spatial Structures