The Concrete Centre
Performance and Sustainability
Concrete’s role in delivering a sustainable built environment through performance benefits is increasingly recognised and utilised by design teams.
This section outlines how concrete can be used to provide comfortable, fit-for-purpose, flexible and safe structures.
The Concrete Centre
Houghton-le-Spring was the first healthcare project to achieve a BREEAM ‘Outstanding’ rating as well as using innovative construction methods
The Concrete Centre
Basements are known for requiring technical expertise in engineering, waterproofing and material specification, but this does not need to limit the design and aesthetic of exposed concrete, as Claire Ackerman of The Concrete Centre and Basement Information Centre explores.
The Concrete Centre
The use of concrete at Coin Street Neighbourhood Centre was fundamental to the low energy strategy for the building, combining natural ventilation and high thermal mass.
The Concrete Centre
The Concrete Centres student hub for architecture, design, and built environment students and lectures. Here, you will find information and resources available to aid concrete learning in UK universities including:
- Student Design and Sustainability Competition
- Best practice design guidance
- Bespoke and on-demand webinars
- In person events and networking
- Design software and tools
- Visiting and live online lectures for students
- Free topical events, including the Sustainability Series
The Concrete Centre
Precast concrete is virtually unlimited in its application including the entire structure or selected elements such as frame, floors, walls, stairs or balconies. The advantages of factory production, combined with the inherent benefits of concrete, provide compelling reasons to use precast concrete.
The Concrete Centre
Offsite construction is in demand. But rather than highlight the much-repeated benefits of design for manufacture and assembly (DFMA) I have considered here the significant benefits that concrete can bring to offsite construction that can save carbon and cost as well as contribute to health, wellbeing and our adaptation to climate change.
The Concrete Centre
In the residential low-rise sector both housebuilders and homeowners have consistently found that concrete and masonry provide the best all-round housing solution.
The Concrete Centre
Reducing the amount of material required for construction is a key focus for reducing embodied carbon and supporting a more circular economy. This includes reuse of existing resources, more efficient use of resources through structural design and material specification and reduction of waste in manufacture, construction and in use.
The Concrete Centre
Elaine Toogood explains some of the revisions in BREEAM New Construction and how the new credits for material efficiency and adaptability to climate change are an opportunity to score credits for concrete and masonry buildings.