Skyscrapers made out of plastic waste ?
I believe it is only a matter of time when 3 D Printing
Technology will solve two major problems of the World , viz:
·
Need to construct millions of houses ( some 30 million in India
alone – by 2022 )
·
Need to reduce / eliminate,
pollution caused by 300 million tons of Plastic Waste per year world-wide ( 5.5
million tons in India )
Over the past few months , 3D Printing of
houses , has made considerable progress ( see blogs below )
But , so far , this method of construction has relied
on building materials consisting of :
·
Old Construction Debris
·
Desert Sand
·
Debris from old Asphalt /
Brickbat Roads
·
And saves,
* 30% -60 % of building materials
* 70 % of
production time
* 80 % of construction cost
Today’s
Times of India ( 15 March 2017 ) carries following news :
A construction firm based in
Dubai has announced plans to build the world’s first 3D-printed skyscraper.
The
company, called Cazza, has
confirmed that it will be erected in the United Arab Emirates.
It
says it will use a new technique called “
crane printing ” to create the building.
“When
we first thought of implementing 3D printing technologies, we were mostly thinking of houses and
low-rise buildings,” Cazza CEO Chris Kelsey told Construction Week Online.
“Developers kept asking us if it was possible to build a 3D printed skyscraper.
This led us to begin researching how we could adapt the technologies for taller
structures.”
Cazza
is yet to disclose the building’s planned height or any commencement or
completion dates, but the Encyclopedia Britannica describes a
skyscraper as a building “of unusual height, generally greater than 40 or 50
stories”.
Concrete and steel will be two of the materials printed by the company’s
cranes.
“The crane printing system can be
easily adopted with existing cranes which means we don’t have to build cranes
from scratch,” said Fernando De Los Rios, Cazza’s
chief operating officer.
“We are adding new
features to make it adaptable to high wind speeds along with the use of our
layer smoothing system that creates completely flat surfaces. You won’t know
it’s 3D printed.”
Now imagine if Cazza succeeds in
shredding BILLIONS of PLASTIC
BOTTLES / CARTONS / WRAPPINGS / BAGS / TOYS etc , mix these with some RESIN to turn it into plastic
concrete ( PLASTRETE ? ) and use it to 3 D print that skyscraper !
QUESTION
:
Shall we wait till Cassa
( or the Chinese company , WinSun or the Russian company APIS COR ) , develops this technology , so
that we may “ license “ it ?
How about throwing this as a challenge to our Start Ups / Scientists /
Engineers ?
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
15 March 2015
www.hemenparekh.in
/ blogs
No comments:
Post a Comment