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July 2020

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Wall panel awaits installation at Scenic Trails Condominium, Hamilton, ON. J U LY 2 0 2 0 | 11 Precast Concrete P H OTO G R A P H Y CO U RT E SY L A FA RG EH O LC I M ; CO R E S L A B S T RU C T U R E S provides a dense, smooth surface valued not only for its low permeability (which prevents the ingress of harmful chlorides and other materials) but also for its esthetics and ability to closely transfer form details to the hardened surface. UHPC is hardly the only product with enor- mous market potential. LafargeHolcim is currently focusing a lot of its attention on Solidia, a unique technology that enables precasters to produce lower carbon construction materials. Solidia is the result of a partnership between LafargeHolcim and Solidia Technologies: By work- ing together, the two companies have created a reduced CO2 cement that together with a propri- etary concrete mix design and a specialized curing process utilizing CO2, creates a concrete with up to 70 percent lower carbon footprint than traditional Portland Cement systems. Precast companies using the technology have demonstrated improved esthetics of the concrete products, from no efflorescence and more vibrant colours. They have also benefited from cost reduc- tions and increased production capacity thanks to achieving full concrete strength in less than one day. By transforming CO2 into a usable material, Solidia products can give concrete paving and block pro- ducers a competitive edge. For its part, Solidia emphasizes the importance of this type of concrete by pointing out that for every ton of cement produced, a ton of CO2 is released into the atmosphere, which makes the concrete industry overall responsible for up to seven percent of total global carbon emissions and up to half of industrial energy use in emerging nations. Solidia regards its lower carbon product is the first major change to manufacturing in almost 200 years and is "part of the answer to urgent business, societal, and envi- ronmental needs." With Lafarge Canada's ongoing sustainabil- ity initiatives and plant upgrades, there's potential for further CO2 reduction initatives. Recently, Lafarge Canada issued an Environmental Product Declaration providing independently verified evi- dence of its efforts to build better. Currently the Calgary operation is planning to switch all con- crete mixes to include GUL cement. This material will reduce Lafarge's total CO2 per tonne of product produced. In addition, some early strength charac- teristics of GUL are being trialed. With this kind of potential, the shift to include GUL cement in precast concrete components is something Lafarge is eager to do, and Lafarge Canada is currently working with CPCI to have Canada-wide formal acceptance of the equivalency of GUL in precast operations. New products directly related to precast are in abundance in 2020, case in point: Peikko Canada Inc.'s parent, Peikko Group, recently launched Twin Corbel and PSB Plus. The former is a bearing sup- port corbel for TT slabs, secondary beams, and ribbed slab structures with topping concrete. Twin Corbel is designed especially for customers that pro- duce TT slabs, and thanks to its simple and light design it is easy to pre-assemble. Supplementary reinforcement is scalable according to loads, which makes the precaster's work a lot easier. PSB Plus Punching Reinforcement System is a com- bination of vertical PSB studs with unique horizontal PSH studs placed on top of the column. Together with simple installation of horizontal elements, PSB Plus is a cost-efficient and practical solution for flat slabs subjected to extreme load requirements. Coreslab Structures, which has 17 precast/pre- stressed concrete facilities across North America, is busy with a host of projects in 2020. "We're pro- viding the floor slab for a new flagship Mercedes dealership in Etobicoke, and we've just begun work on the 2021 Canada Summer Games arena and residences at Brock University," says Joshua Fede, sales consultant at Coreslab. "We're also busy with Canada's first multi-level passive house: a Y WCA facility that will boast a 90 percent reduction in energy consumption when completed." That project, located in Hamilton, requires Coreslab to provide continuous insulated exterior panels with an R-40 value; walls, beams, columns, and hollow core solutions. "It's not a huge project in size but it's a big deal for Coreslab and the industry as it may set the standard for other, similar build- ings in the future," says Fede. Fede describes the current state of the indus- try accordingly: "Historically Coreslab was a hollow core manufacturer, but in the early 2010s we broad- ened out in the precast sector, and today precast is keeping everyone busy as the market continues to grow and thrive." John Carson, executive director at AltusGroup Inc., says his organization continues to expand into the Canadian market and that overall in North America: "precasters' schedules are full, with demand being strong. Depending on the precaster, production windows exist for new precast projects." However, that doesn't mean the precast sector can afford not to continually self-promote, as build- ing envelope system competition remains intense. "In December, AltusGroup members in North America met as a group and with partners from the general contracting, developer, architectural, and supplier communities to preview 2020 perspec- tives, discuss innovation, and determine better ways of reaching the building and design commu- nity, which continues to be a challenge in the new decade," says Carson. "Other groups – including those representing the wood and steel sector – are doing an effective job in 'selling' their products as the 'building material of choice,' and precast must present its case as well. In today's market, time, speed, and reduced labour favour precast in addi- tion to fire and thermal performance benefits." It's entirely natural for AltusGroup to communicate with the architectural community, as it did in 2004 when five precasters and TechFab (now Chomarat NA for C-Grid) teamed up to form the company in a joint effort to accelerate new product development and commercialization in the precast industry with CarbonCast technology. The group now boasts 18 member companies and 30 manufacturing plants across North America. Partnerships with ground- breaking firms such as Kawneer (windows) and Graphic Concrete Ltd. have cumulatively advanced the desirability of precast in the design realm. Incidentally, Graphic Concrete technology transfers patterns as a surface retarder via membrane placed at the bot- tom of a form, onto which concrete is cast, cured, and extracted; the retarder is washed away, revealing the pattern permanently affixed to the concrete surface. Carson says he is certain that precast will continue to make inroads in 2020 and beyond, Solidia Concrete Hollow Core.

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