Tall wood buildings are not just dreams, but reality: the USDA, conjunction with the Softwood Lumber Board and the Binational Softwood Lumber Council, announced winners in the 2015 Tall Wood Building competition. From the USDA website:
At a press conference hosted in New York this morning, Secretary Vilsack congratulated the competition winners. “The U.S. wood products industry is vitally important as it employs more than 547,000 people in manufacturing and forestry, with another 2.4 million jobs supported by U.S. private-forest owners,” said Vilsack. “By embracing the benefits of wood as a sustainable building material, these demonstration projects have the ability to help change the face of our communities, mitigate climate change and support jobs in rural America. I look forward to seeing how these two buildings help lead the way in furthering the industry.” …
The two winning proposals – Framework and 475 West 18th – were selected by a panel of distinguished jurors in the architecture and engineering fields who are familiar with innovative wood building systems. While each took a unique approach, both projects met the Competition’s criteria to showcase the safe application, practicality and sustainability of a minimum 80-foot structure that uses mass timber, composite wood technologies and innovative building techniques.
Note that these are proposals, without a tree cut down as yet. TreeHugger.com‘s Lloyd Alter reports on the prize:
Although a hundred years ago building taller buildings in wood was relatively common, particularly on the west coast, It fell out of favor as the big trees became scarce, and as building codes changed to promote noncombustible steel and concrete. The prize money is being used to catch up, for “the exploratory phase of their projects, including the research and development necessary to utilize engineered wood products in high-rise construction in the U.S”. And while the steel, concrete and masonry people are apoplectic about this and keep running ads screaming about burning buildings, the heavy timber buildings like these are have been shown to be pretty safe.
The home of the U. S. Tall Wood Building Prize Competition is here. From the East Coast winner:
130-134 Holdings LLC, in partnership with Spiritos Properties, SHoP Architects, Arup, Icor Associates, and environmental consultancy Atelier Ten, proposed 475 West 18th, a residential condominium building, as a transformative and sustainable prototype for the design and construction industry, demonstrating an innovative approach to going beyond a limited palette of materials and systems for high-rise construction. Expanding the palette with wood, a locally sourced and renewable material, provides a low-carbon, more economically sound building solution.
475 West 18th’s extensive use of wood structural elements and other wood products allows the team to set ambitious sustainability targets in the building’s design, construction, and operation. By combining aggressive load reduction with energy efficient systems, the project team anticipates reducing overall energy consumption by at least 50 percent relative to current energy codes. It will also target LEED Platinum certification, as well as pursue higher levels of sustainability not captured in the LEED system.
And the West Coast winner:
Framework: An Urban + Rural Ecology
Given its prominent location and public visibility, a key element of the building design led by Thomas Robinson, principal of LEVER Architecture, is to communicate at street level the project’s innovative use of wood and engineering technology in the development of a high rise structure, along with its relationship to the rural economy. Integrating lessons learned from tall timber structures in Canada and Europe, Robinson and his team are expected to incorporate new structural and architectural technologies that include an engineered wood core and lateral system for seismic integrity and CLT floor panels fabricated up to 50’ in length.
Should we start expecting gargoyles carved of wood next? This does sound fascinating. CLT, cross laminated timber, has several manufacturers. This one, APA, I picked at random, neither endorsing nor impugning:
Cross-laminated timber (CLT) is a large-scale, prefabricated, solid engineered wood panel. Lightweight yet very strong, with superior acoustic, fire, seismic, and thermal performance, CLT is also fast and easy to install, generating almost no waste onsite. CLT also offers design flexibility and low environmental impacts. For these reasons, cross-laminated timber is proving to be a highly advantageous alternative to conventional materials like concrete, masonry, or steel, especially in multi-family and commercial construction.
And this great picture:
