Issue link: http://digital.canadawide.com/i/755184
DECEMBER 2016 | 15 Concrete A Concrete proves to be a resource-efficient building material by ANGELA ALTASS As the impacts of climate change continue to be felt amidst other economic, social and environmental stressors, the difficulty of maintaining robust and resilient infrastructure systems increases. Recent reports concerning global carbon dioxide (CO2) levels in the atmosphere surpassing 400 parts per million and the growing number of geophysical and natural disasters taking place are just some of the reasons why increasing attention is being paid to nat- ural, sustainable and resilient building materials like concrete, which has been shown to lessen the impact on the environment over its life cycle when compared to other building materials. These kinds of facts force people to think about the resilience of their communities and disaster recov- ery. "Property losses due to disasters continue to esca- late at a staggering rate," says Brian Hall, managing director of the Canadian Precast Prestressed Concrete Institute (CPCI) and author of the article Adaption of Infrastructure for Climate Change. "The key to disas- ter recovery is not only to get essential services back up and running, but also to get people back to work. That means buildings and structures must not only resist damage caused by adverse events but must also be in a condition suitable for occupancy as soon as possible." Hall points out that this is where concrete, including precast concrete, can play an important role. Not only is the material extremely durable and resilient, but as life cycle assessment studies and real world exam- ples demonstrate, it is also a resource-efficient build- ing material. For example, its inherent thermal mass enables energy efficiency improvements of 70 percent over the Model National Energy Code for Buildings and improves a building's passive survivability in the event services such as power, heating fuel, or water are lost. Concrete products can also be re-used and recycled. There are a variety of ways to incorporate precast concrete to make projects more durable and disaster resistant, explains Hall. "Builders, architects and devel- opers are recognizing that more durable buildings built with resilient products are more resistant to damage from natural and manmade disasters, which dramat- ically reduces the impact on our economy," says Hall. The resiliency of concrete may not be a complete surprise to some, but the concrete and cement indus- tries are also contributing to the mitigation of cli- mate change. Adam Auer, VP of environment and sustainabil- ity at the Cement Association of Canada notes that in the last 20 years, the Canadian cement industry has reduced the energy required to make a ton of cement Building Resilience PHOTOGRAPHY COURTESY LAFARGE NORTH AMERICA Mount Royal Parkade in Calgary is a perfect example of a precast structure that could be disassembled and relocated.