Carbon footprint, waste management, densification, energy efficiency, renewable materials… One cannot speak of sustainable development without reflecting on the city model that we need so that urban environments grow with the least possible impact on the environment and taking advantage of natural resources. Part of the conversation has been installed in public discourse for years and social awareness is growing, but more far-reaching and transversal changes are needed to transform the way we live and how we build. An idea that is precisely at the center of the educational and research work carried out by the Institute of Advanced Architecture of Catalonia (IAAC).
Since then, and inspired by the culture maker, technology and experimentation have gone hand in hand in each of the 11 master’s degrees taught by the institution, advancing trends and conversations and experimenting with old and innovative techniques: Advanced Architecture; Ecological Buildings and Biocities; Emerging Designs; Robotics and Advanced Manufacturing… When the IAAC opened its doors in the Poble Nou neighbourhood, more than two decades ago, they talked about digital design and manufacturing when no one yet did; its first prototype, from 2001, already used the internet of things; and more than a decade ago the effort turned towards ecology, wood and sustainable construction. The institution has agreements with the UPC and the US MIT Center for Bits and Atoms, among others, and its manufacturing laboratories (Fab Labs) are part of a network of more than 2,000 similar spaces around the world.
“The IAAC has been quite a pioneer when it comes to detecting what those trends have been that are going to mark the future of cities, the way of living and the materials with which we are going to build,” says Daniel Ibáñez, new director of a institution that aims, in the coming years, to increase the national projection of a school whose students are mostly foreigners (96-97%). What there is no doubt about today is that, in order to counteract the climatic, economic and social challenges, we must change the way we design and build; and that necessarily implies much more information. “We work a lot with data: when we start to make a self-sufficient building, if we don’t have data on the context, the environment, how the sun moves, where it really makes sense to have windows or photovoltaic panels… When we start to planning an urban district, if we do not understand data related to the economy of the place, mobility, environmental issues or waste management, it is impossible to do it”, argues Areti Markopoulo, academic director of IAAC. The Catalan institution dedicates between 25 and 30% of its income to some type of scholarship.
Renewable materials and sustainability
Innovating in architecture does not always imply jumping forward. The answers to the social and environmental challenges we face may lie in the past, but also in the environment around us. Innovating, for example, can mean building using materials such as wood or earth, which have been used for centuries, reinterpreting their use thanks to the data provided by technology and with traditional techniques from the most diverse places in the world. “Why build with wood?” asks Ibáñez: “The key issue is the environment. Making a concrete building is a source of emissions, while another one made of wood is a sink for them. The first requires ovens at 1,200 degrees, which implies a great deal of energy; while the second is a deposit of all the carbon that the tree absorbs when it grows and that is fixed in the wood, where it will remain for 100 or 200 years”. The innovation is in the use of cross-laminated timber (or CLT, for its acronym in English), something that he adds, “is revolutionizing the construction sector because it allows to make, instead of walls and structural floors, structural facades”. In 2021 they presented Mass Wooda national network of experts, companies and organizations to promote industrialized solid wood construction.
Valldaura Labs is the headquarters of the IAAC in the Collserola Natural Park, on the outskirts of Barcelona. The master’s degree in Advanced Ecological Buildings and Biocities (MAEBB) is taught there, an immersive program in an old restored farmhouse where students reside who, during the year, are trained to understand how to make ecological buildings; collect solar and thermal data; carbon footprints related to the materiality of the building… and many other aspects related to the problem of climate change. Each year, the students also spend the last few months manufacturing a 1:1 scale prototype: not only do they design it, but they define it, execute it, assemble it and experience it; using local materials and wood from the adjacent forest, which they exploit following a Sustainable Forest Management Plan. Now, is it feasible to think about continuing to grow without concrete? Not completely, explains Markopoulo: “It is a material that is still necessary, but its protection must be reduced and it must be combined with other materials”.
Projects like the forest observation tower that this year’s students are building; the Tiny House (2019), a small self-sufficient house capable of generating its own energy and in which the students experimented, for example, with flat geometry inside and more complex shapes outside; the Quarantine House (2020) and the solar greenhouse (2021). “There is a beautiful idea that is to return to nature to learn things that we had forgotten: when a tree is cut down, how a forest is managed so as not to kill it; what can you do with the resin of a tree, with its fibers… We are talking about circular bioeconomy”, explains Vicent Guallart, director of Valldaura Labs.
It should not be forgotten that sustainability also has a human and social facet. Daniel Sorial, a 27-year-old student from Egypt, took the Master of Advanced Architecture because it offered him an overview of the different disciplines and how they are related to architecture, opening up the possibility to design and pursue a wide variety of interests. “But also because it allowed me to investigate the relationship between neuroscience and architecture, and how spaces affect the cognitive-emotional behavior of users.” Some of the projects developed here by the students are aimed at rethinking the densification of cities; or to address the nature of self-sufficient buildings, where they work in emergency scenarios with extreme weather conditions: for example, a building that is capable of changing its roof to collect water, or that has photovoltaic panels to collect solar energy.
Innovation in the DNA
Digital fabrication, 3D printing, drones, experimentation with new materials… “20 years ago, when we talked about digital fabrication, hardly anyone knew about it, but today it is relatively widespread,” Ibáñez recalls. But what does it consist of? “Basically, you give the machine a completely digital geometry, something that you have drawn on the computer; the program translates it and then moves a drill bit following the design you have made”. Although 3D printing is a common technology in other areas, its use in construction is completely new, and there are hardly any prototypes exploring its feasibility. One of them is the 3D House, a small house with one room built in Valldaura, with earth and thanks to this technology.
“Until 50 years ago, half of the world’s population still lived in earthen houses. And it was not until 10 years ago when, for reasons of pollution and sustainability, we realized that it is a very good construction material”, says Edouard Cabay, co-director of the 3D Printing Architecture postgraduate course. “Earth is an interesting material because it didn’t take any energy to turn it into a building material; it is 100% natural and pollution-free, and does not require transportation. Of course there are also some drawbacks, such as lower resistance to water. But if you design it well, these aspects do not necessarily make it a bad building”, he argues. “Because it is such an ancient material, communities around the world have developed for centuries ways to make an earthen building behave well in its physical, climatic and social environment.”
Printing a building with earth, however, is a new path in which the pioneers lack references. “With everything we do, we run into a lot of little problems, and we have to invent solutions. That is why, instead of inventing everything from scratch, there is an important research and documentation work”, explains Cabay. 3D printing also serves to create prototypes quickly and easily, while in other disciplines the prototype represents a significant expense. “And, if you remove the 3D printing component, it is a type of construction that is already done in some way in developing countries, especially in desert climates where water is not usually a problem,” says Ibáñez.
Automation, robotics and customization
“What we are working on at IAAC is how automation and robotics can allow us to build with the experience of people, with local artisans,” says Markopoulo. “Before, to make a facade where each sheet was different and had its own orientation, the cost was very high. But we have seen that, to make a facade with sheets, it is interesting that it follows the movement of the sun, to achieve maximum interior comfort. And we also experiment with both aerial (drones) and ground robots (rovers), which can also scan environments and extract data.
All these uses have practical and immediate applications: for example, when remodeling a building, you fly the drone and you can have a precise scan, but not only of the shapes, but also at a thermal level, to know where it is hotter and colder. It is a type of technology that can be applied on multiple scales, from a simple building to the Collserola valley itself, where they have a robotic agriculture project with which to see the state of the plants, monitor a large space to detect the best places for each type of agriculture or measure the quality of the land.
EL PAÍS TRAINING in Twitter Y Facebook
Subscribe to the newsletter of Training of EL PAÍS
#sustainable #cities #imagined