The "vernacular" use of steel

Vernacular architecture is linked to the traditional uses of building materials. This definition can be applied only loosely to steel architecture.

Vernacular architecture is linked to the traditional uses of building materials where these traditions have been developed and refined empirically over many years. Such a building is illustrated by the cottage shown. Here the soft chalkstone walls have been given a waterproof plinth in an attempt to stop the water rotting them at the base, a lightweight roof covering of thatch and small window openings. Moreover the more expensive material of brick is used for the chimney stack where the soft chalk would be inappropriate. The method of assembly of the cottage could be said to be in the craft tradition in that the method of assembly remains relatively constant, only changing slowly in response to technological developments. Given such a definition of the term vernacular it is only possible to apply it loosely to the use of steel in architecture. The development of steel as a building material has proceeded in step with the development of the technologies brought into being as a result of the industrial revolution. Thus the material was developed alongside the methods necessary for its assembly into the components, whether structural or nonstructural, of a building. The similarity of using steel in a vernacular way to the Arts and Crafts movement is in that the architecture is intended to result from the appearance and properties of the materials used and the way in which the properties of the materials dictate particular building details. The relationship between this approach to design and the Arts and Crafts movement is strong, in that the architecture is intended to result from the appearance and properties of the materials used and the way in which the properties of the materials dictate particular building details. The simple white roof of the Guest House for Missionaries in Dar-es-Salaam by Hubert-Jan Henket illustrates the way by which the detailing of a simple material such as flat sheets of corrugated steel can be used to create a shelter both in terms of climatic modification and through the symbolism of the haven that may be found under the white roof. As Peter Buchanan says: "Hubert-Jan Henket intended his building as an unextravagant model for the tropics, meeting the challenges of the climate yet requiring minimal maintenance and mechanical ventilation...Seven degrees south of the Equator the climate is hot and humid, so continuous air movement is required for comfort. Natural

air movements are the land and sea breezes (at night and day respectively) and seasonal monsoon winds from east and south-east and the stack effect caused by hot air rising within a confined space. The building is designed to exploit all these as well as the turbulence from tall buildings around, which causes winds to gust from all directions. Accommodation is in two raised parallel wings joined towards either end by chapel and dining room and so enclosing a narrow court open to the sky above and the streets below. Circulation is via open balconies, so each wing is one room deep with tall louvered windows and doors angled to welcome in breezes from any direction. Broad overhangs shade the windows and allow them to be left open in downpours while thermal mass is generally kept down to minimise the build-up of heat. The off-white coating of the corrugated steel sheet roof reflects 55 per cent of the heat falling on it and a well-ventilated cavity below it allows most of the heat absorbed to be carried away.

The diagram illustrates the principles involved. The Guest House for Missionaries uses a simple, standard material in an uncomplicated way to produce an architecture that responds to its climatic environment and yet exudes, "a quiet, confident and pleasurable sense of authenticity that will not quickly fade." An excellent example of corrugated steel used to create a 'roof of welcome' is the Health Centre at Marienburg in Surinam, designed by Lucien Lafour and Rikkert Wijk. The same material of corrugated steel has been used to create a roof of welcome over the Health Centre at Marienburg in Surinam, designed by Lucien Lafour and Rikkert Wijk. In the words of Aldo van Eyck: "In the tropics an awful lot of people often wait long and patiently every day for something that sometimes isn't there at all - in dust and appalling heat. People in Marienburg who go to Lucien's clinic ill, weary and apprehensive will be made to feel a bit better by the way the building receives them and lets them stay. If this isn't a good and beautiful building, I don't know one." The plan organises the building into three sections, the polyclinic which is freely open to people, the ward area which is private and a work area between the two zones.

"Polyclinic and wards are loosely arranged as pavilions under a huge oversailing roof which, reflecting the plan organisation, is composed of several independent roofs and awnings. Concrete columns support concrete gutters which serve as beams between which span the roof trusses. Over the waiting areas though half trusses span to timber posts from which rafters extend awnings to protect waiting areas and terraces and so welcome visitors by sheltering even those who have not yet entered. The roofs are well insulated and the ridges capped with ventilating monitors with double banks of louvres." The relationship between the function of the roof as an external surface that diverts water in an area of high rainfall and an internal surface that provides shade in the hot sun following the heavy showers is further described by van Eyck: "The clinic is characterised, it seems to me, by the way it receives people all round at the sides as generously as it catches the rain all round from above, for the 'gutters' here are at the same time roofs, actually of the concrete verandahs below. These support the wooden canopies, which work like enormous lungs. A real boon, that great shady world underneath, where there is always a bit of a breeze. It could be said that there is a good understanding here between the building and specific local circumstances, wind, rain and heat. And in this connection, look how sunlight and shadow, light and dark, inside and outside, open and closed, appear to full advantage both in gradation and contrast everything diversified, adjustable. Without expensive mechanical aids, a good climate is achieved by means of the building itself." Glenn Murcutt's designs join the style of the traditional Aboriginal bark huts with the permanent stone architecture and the skills of using materials such as corrugated iron sheets brought to Australia by the new settlers. His architecture is genuinely Australian. The vernacular tradition of Australia and New Zealand is itself different from that of the permanent settlements of Europe. Using the example of Australia the Aboriginal bark huts were built as temporary structures that were "to touch the earth lightly". When the European settlers arrived although they brought with them the permanent stone architecture of Europe they also brought prefabricated buildings which used materials such as corrugated iron sheets. A new vernacular tradition of buildings made from these standard dry-constructed components developed. These two traditions have been united in the work of Glenn Murcutt who has explored the form of the simple hut and related it to the materials of prefabrication without ever forgetting the particularities of the site in an attempt to develop an architecture that is genuinely Australian.

The house at Moruya, New South Wales designed by Glenn Murcutt is an example where standard parts have been combined to produce a building directly related to the Australian rural environment. In the House at Moruya, New South Wales which was built for a family who had camped on the site for many years, the rectangular box, divided into bays with a service wall along the north side, is topped by an asymmetrical roof of curved corrugated steel. As Rory Spence indicated: "Murcutt developed this early in the design, as a response to the site - to the rhythms of the curved folds in the hills around the house, and the waves of the sea. He also wanted to suggest flight, perhaps in response to the seagulls and eagles which glide overhead on the strong coastal air currents, and he wanted to give the house an openness and lightness analogous to the experience of camping under canvas. The planning of the house divides the single volume into a series of separated bays for living and sleeping areas for the parents and their children and their friends. The bays are linked by an implied corridor created in front of the service zone which, with the north wall, buffers the living space from the cold southerly winds. In addition: "the south wall has only one window, in the parents' living area - a framed view of the hillside behind - but there is the continuous fixed clerestorey above, set out from the wall at its lower edge to accommodate timber ventilation panels, in the horizontal plane, operated with a pole from inside. Thus, all internal spaces can be cross-ventilated, while the doors in the spinal corridor can also be opened up to create an east-west breezeway. On the north and east walls the roof overhang shades the unprotected clerestorey between the equinoxes, and shades the whole wall for two and a half months around the summer solstice. In mid-winter the sun penetrates right into the spinal corridor, but can be controlled by external louvre blinds operated from the interior." The standard parts both spatially and materially of the Australian rural shed have been combined to produce a building that is directly related to the climate and form of the place and yet it retains the quality of the deliberately man-made object within the landscape that denotes the presence of architecture. Corrugated steel has been used for the low budget offices in Vicenza designed by Renzo. Vernacular use of steel implies that standard components will be assembled on site in a more or less standard way, unlike the Arts and Crafts movement where the skill

of the individual craftsman was inherent in the use of traditional materials such as masonry and timber. In a different context the inherent strength of the curved corrugated sheet has been used by Renzo Piano to provide offices at Vicenza on a low budget. The small, "steel and glass catenary tent" provides an extension to an existing factory for office workers. Piano himself said: "Form as form does not interest me. Of course, space is important. But I never start by saying "what magic space might we create here?", and then follow with technique. The two come, must come, together." Thus, Piano underlines his allegiance to the vernacular tradition in that the technique of putting together the available materials will itself, in the hands of the designer, be capable of producing architecture. Unlike the philosophy behind the Arts and Crafts movement where the skill of the individual craftsman was inherent in the use of traditional materials such as masonry and timber, the vernacular use of steel implies that the standard components will be assembled on site in a more or less standard way. The input of the craftsman is, therefore, negligible (except where things go wrong on site) and the skill rests with the designer in selecting both the best components for the task and the best method of site assembly. Piano uses the economic constraints of the brief to create a unique space and form: "The catenary shape, for cheapness, was obvious; a tension structure with a system of steel struts and ties supporting pre-formed inverted steel arches at 3m centres. Sheets of corrugated steel span between, as permanent shuttering for the 80-100 mm layer of concrete which, beneath 50 mm of insulation and a waterproof membrane, keeps the structure steady. The lopsidedness of the catenary curve, with openings at the top, helps to encourage the natural stack-effect ventilation and cooling in summer, but there is mechanical cooling too which ingeniously combines local custom with what might be regarded as local raw material. Lowara (the parent factory) is a manufacturer of pumps; the attached factory is where they are made, and to help cool this office extension to the building in summer several of these pumps are mounted on the roof to spray the curved surface as required with water, whose absorption of latent heat of evaporation cools the roof and, in turn, the space beneath. It is a variation of the bottle-of-milk-in-wet-sock principle, and it would come as no surprise, perhaps, to those Italian shopkeepers who customarily spray with water the asphalt in front of their shops in summer, to find that it works, and that the interior is always pleasantly cool."

Apart from using the form of the roof as an element in the modification of the internal environment so as to avoid the use of a conventional highly serviced solution, the curved roof form that covers the corridor is used to reflect light into the space. These panels are made of curved corrugated steel which is painted white and light entering through the glass clerestorey is reflected back on to the roof of the corridor and back into the building. Under the main curved roof artificial light is also reflected from the corrugated ceiling to provide a ripple across the surface. This is a richness of architectural experience resulting from the careful execution of a simple structural idea. The civic centre in the small Canadian town of Flin Flon, Manitoba by the IKOY Partnership uses prefabricated steel components which have a rational clarity and come together solidly, attractively and precisely. The civic centre in the small Canadian town of Flin Flon, Manitoba by the IKOY Partnership takes the idea of the assembly of prefabricated components as the means of creating an appropriate architecture a stage further. As Forrest Wilson states: "Plainly a building assembled of industrial parts, the Provincial Center recognizes the disappearance of handcraft and celebrates the skill of building assemblers. It celebrates technical organisation. Sophisticated technology in today's buildings is found not in their form but in their automobile-like assembly. ...The Provincial Center asserts the creative ability of assemblers and sits comfortably with automobiles, the primary contextual reality of our time." The Provincial Center serves what was once a "tent town" some 400 miles to the north of Winnipeg when gold was first discovered there 50 years ago. As mining was established the town changed to a small scale vernacular of frame structures, often put up by the owners, punctuated by the larger mine head gear. However, the new building makes no attempt to reflect this existing vernacular. Rather, the building that contains the government offices and the courtroom which are clustered around a glazed entrance court, remains an industrial building in an essentially industrial landscape. However, the building celebrates rather than apologises for its industrial origins. "Each piece of the building was designed and fabricated far away, brought to Flin Flon, and installed on the site. Each part could be fitted in no other way than it now appears in

the building...Assemblers do not want to puzzle over how a building fits together. They cannot indulge in this luxury when their boss demands they assemble 17 buildings a day. But if the elements have a rational clarity and come together solidly, attractively, and precisely, the "erector can work efficiently and take pride in his accomplishment." The designers executed these ideas through the use of steel columns and steel trusses and corrugated aluminium cladding. Attention was paid to the lifetime of the different building components so that parts could be replaced as was necessary without the destruction of the whole. This was exemplified by the separation of the services and plant: "The mechanical systems of the Provincial Centre are in a separate building, umbilically connected to the working spaces. New systems can be installed in a day without disturbing the workings of the court or offices. The building says clearly that its value is that it can adjust over time and retain its worth." Both Glen Murcutt's designs and the Poole house explore the use of standard steel components to enclose and create spaces. The designs show the unique opportunities offered by steel in creating a new vernacular. The Poole house bears comparison with that of Glen Murcutt above. Both have used existing components and produced architecture through the way in which these components have been fixed together in order to enclose appropriate space. Both houses attempt to introduce a new "vernacular" tradition not through the use of materials that have been around for centuries, since there are none, but through the obvious use of simple materials that modify climate and, rather than blending in with the land from which the materials have been taken as happens in the western vernacular tradition, sit lightly on it in the Aboriginal tradition of the Australian sub-continent. In this context the properties of standard steel components offer a unique opportunity to the designer seeking to create a new vernacular.

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Steel in the environment as an inspiration to architecture

Designers carry a vocabulary within themselves which they add to constantly. Architects build up their vocabulary by studying works of other architects.

Only a very small percentage of designers ever create something that is totally original and that has no root in some precedent. The great majority of designers carry a vocabulary within themselves, a vocabulary that is being added to constantly, and that will form the basis of any design synthesis undertaken. When design students begin their training this vocabulary is often limited and can therefore produce a design synthesis that is immature and unsatisfactory. During the training of a student this vocabulary will be enlarged and enriched until the point is reached where a personal and individual synthesis can be made in response to particular problems. It is the enlargement of this design vocabulary that necessitates such a long and continuing training for those involved in architecture and the other design professions. In architecture much of the vocabulary will be built up from studying and looking at the works of other architects. A student who copies the style of any particular designer is not indulging in plagiarism but rather is attempting to assimilate exactly how the other, maturer, designer approaches a design problem. However, not all of the design vocabulary will result from the study of the buildings of particular architects. Much is gathered in a far more unconscious way and some influences on architectural design will have origins far distant from buildings. Le Corbusier recognised that architectural design can be influenced by the technology of the motor car. He asked designers to explore the design and production of products and apply what might be relevant to architecture. Le Corbusier was probably not the first person, and certainly not the last, to recognise that the technology of the motor car might have something to offer to the designer of a building: "Let us display, then, the Parthenon and the motor-car so that it may be clear that it is a question of two products of selection in different fields, one of which has reached its climax and the other is evolving. That ennobles the automobile. And what then? Well, it remains to use the motor-car as a challenge to our houses and our great buildings..." Le Corbusier, however, challenges architects to do more than merely copy a visual image; making a building to house pineapples in the shape of a giant stone pineapple is only an elementary step in the transfer of ideas. Instead, Le Corbusier asks designers to

explore the design and production of other products and to extract what may be appropriate to the problem of architecture. The interior of the Museum at Parma by Guido Canali is an example of making use of steel scaffolding as a permanent structure inside the converted building. Steel components have been used to enhance the design. Architects, however, have tended to be less brutal in their borrowing of steel components and have made use of them to enhance design rather than to dictate it. The interior of the Museum at Parma by Guido Canali makes use of steel scaffolding as a permanent structure inside the converted building. The part of the enormous Palazzo della Pilotta at Parma within which the National Gallery of Parma is housed has been carefully reconstructed during a ten year programme. The work to the gallery has centred on the provision of a new circulation route to join the three formerly disconnected spaces that formed the whole. The new route was marked out by the new metal detailing. Changes have also been introduced within the spaces themselves: "The original oak beams and floor-joists were replaced by a light but cumbersome scaffolding structure, the basis (and aesthetic) for an interchangeable display framework from which is suspended or which supports a modular panelling system, laid horizontally or vertically to act as floor or partition. This system, slightly contradicted by the permanent-looking concrete central stair and elegant handrails, was similarly applied in the north wing. The white-painted panels, perpendicular to the perimeter, and the scaffold create stark spaces within the old shell, whose walls have been stripped of plaster and sanded to reveal the mellow tone and texture of the seventeenth-century brickwork." However, rather than simply using the scaffolding for the creation of an interior, Canali enriches his architecture by using the fact that scaffolding is essentially a temporary system which has been developed for change and designs a modular system of panels which can be hung from the internal structure. As Frances Anderton comments: "By juxtaposing a lightweight, metallic structure he will emphasise the enduring, robust quality of the masonry shell. But the newcomer is no wallflower. Ironically the supposedly permeable framework becomes necessarily so complex, its reticular scaffold and stark panels (creating space in the simplest, purist way, with lines and planes, verticals and horizontals) so angular and brashly metallic that it almost takes over from its refined host. It is this meeting of opposites that gives the design its richness."

The architect Richard Horden transferred technology and components from the world of yachting and used them to create architecture. In contrast to the transfer of an existing steel system, the architect Richard Horden has transferred technology and components from the world of yachting and used them to create architecture. Here an aluminium system has been transferred but to use the system in a new way steel components have been required. Hence steel, rather than providing the inspiration, is now providing the means to allow the transfer to happen: "At Woodgreen, the structure is a concrete site slab supporting a single-storey frame with aluminium tubular columns on a 3.6m grid. These support aluminium ovalsection roof spars. The headpiece that joins columns and spars is a stainless steel cross, 400mm wide, which extends down the hollow centres of all the members and is bolted to them by stainless steel bolts with short lengths of stainless steel pipe inserted so that tightening the bolt does not squeeze the spar. Other holes and slots are made for services and fixings, and this causes no problems because the spars are not fully stressed at the span ends." In transferring the technology alterations have to be made to aluminium members conceived as yacht masts and designed fundamentally as compression members. This causes problems when the aluminium tubes which work well as columns have to be used as beams and are, therefore, subject to bending moments. As John Winter points out: "Richard Horden's response to this problem is to treat his frame as a wind-frame - it is self-supporting, can take light loads and distribute services, but where there is real work to be done, the secondary members of the structure must take the load. The roof panels are let in between the spars - each one is framed in a steel angle, sufficiently strong to take the load into the corner points and hence to the columns, so in the completed roof, the spars, while intellectually necessary for the integrity of the frame and its possibility for change, are structurally redundant." Elsewhere, stainless steel cables are used as cross- bracing to emphasise further the transfer of technology from the lightweight world of yachts and hang gliders to the architectural world of house and home.

The building may be a high energy user and there may be problems of weathering with the method used for rainwater disposal from the roof but Horden would never have conceived of the house as the perfect answer to the creation of lightweight userconstruct house; it is just a step on the way: "Most architects are not like that. To us the perfection of a particular building is allimportant. The buildings we most admire are usually complete in themselves, and are not for showing possibilities or as a step in a development...by designing for his own family, he (Horden) has retained the ability to keep changing things and so has turned the conventional notion of architecture as finished product into architecture as process." Rather than using images that suggest shipping the use of steel made it possible for the Boat-O-Tel to be able to float. Rather than suggest images of shipping for a building that is to do with the transfer of people to and from the liner, the Boat-O-Tel is most definitely a hotel which has been built of steel in order to allow it to float. Designed in the Netherlands, its purpose is to take guests for cruises on the Rhine. Not only built of steel, the box like floating hotel is: "...using a universal prefabrication system, already successfully applied to the construction of houses, hospitals and bungalows for overseas countries." The plans and section show that the layout, which is made up of two passenger cabin decks, a restaurant, hall, lounge, bar and shop is common to most land locked hotels, with the addition of the upper promenade deck. The cockpit can be raised and lowered hydraulically to allow safe passage of the Rhine. Structurally, the Boat-O-Tel is a catamaran of two giant pontoons joined by an intermediary structure. "The decks are supported by a main frame work consisting of columns and struts. The former are rectangular hollow steel sections...and the latter HE sections. The columns are arranged in three rows at 3 metre spacing. They are welded to the edge of the pontoons and onto the intermediate member of the hull. The middle deck, which rests on the struts, is a combined structure of steel and concrete in which the two materials act together. A galvanised steel sheet with trapezoidal ribs, with round pressed flanges, serves as a permanent formwork, but also as main reinforcement to an in situ concrete slab 12 cm (120 mm) thick. The promenade deck is a flat chequer plate 5 mm thick resting on the HE beams."

The walls are prefabricated using cold-formed galvanised steel sections, bolted together, and shaped so that panels can be simply eased into them. The panels are constructed of a core of insulation faced with differing standards of wood particle boards. The Boat-O-Tel is, therefore, a building that is floated as a boat and, at the same time, a boat that has been largely constructed using building rather then naval technology. These cross-fertilisations illustrate the possibilities where technologies open themselves to other influences. How well the Boat-O-Tel will last remains to be seen. An example of steel used to suggest a light-weight but reliable shelter can be found in David White's Hostel for the Handicapped in Hampshire, built under the direction of Colin Stansfield Smith at Hampshire County Architect's Department. An antithesis of the hint of impermanence given by the station in Brazil is found in the use of steel to suggest a light-weight but reliable shelter in David White's Hostel for the Handicapped in Hampshire, built under the direction of Colin Stansfield Smith at Hampshire County Architect's Department. Nor is the image of shelter a purely formal concern to the users. As Gillian Darley comments: "Independence may be achieved by learning how to cope, along with others in the same predicament, or it may be a solitary affair of coping alone. This is not an abstract matter in which the building performs as a symbol, but unpalatable physical reality; unsentimental in approach, the building mirrors the needs of those who live there - to be exposed to things, including the world of the able-bodied, while the essential support remains at hand." Under the umbrella of the roof the accommodation is grouped around a central street with an interrupted edge formed by planters, porches and trellis work. The accommodation is made up of six rented flats which are intended for those who will live permanently at the hostel, and a series of groups of bedsitters for those who may be encouraged to greater independence and eventually leave the Hostel. The bedsitters are arranged in groups of five and six with shared dining and sitting rooms and with a shared front entrance from the street. The bedsitters are arranged to have an external wall and each has access to a paved area which begins under the shelter of the roof

and then extends into the surrounding garden. The permanent flats have a similar access to the outdoors. Whereas the materials used for the construction of the flats and bedsitters are traditional masonry and timber, softened by the generous planting, the roof is of a different technology and appears to hover as a protection somewhere between the enclosure of the masonry structures and the freedom of the outside world: "A great cloak of profiled PVC was thrown over the internal public space, allowing the bright lit forum below to be used to maximum advantage. There the design starts again from first principles; this time with a cellular arrangement of linked, banked rooms; 24 bedsitting rooms, six sheltered flats and other shared facilities. It is the old trick of the railway shed; the great umbrella, which turns out to be inhabited by a family of smaller structures...The roof section swoops over the accommodation, only given substance by its adherence to the light steel frame below. Essentially open-ended, the roof is slightly sealed by a system of skirts on the exposed edges. Self-effacing and translucent, it leaves the accommodation below free." In Sir Michael Hopkins' cutlery factory designed for David Mellor in Derbyshire the use of steel enriches the architecture through the association of images. The circular form came from the gasholder that formerly stood on the site and the structural resolution of the clear roof form which uses steel technology related to the bicycle wheel. The creation is a building that seems at peace with both its purpose and setting. The transfer of the image produced by the shelter of the umbrella to the Hostel that provides a temporary rest for those who need to prepare themselves for a return to the ordinary world is illustrative of the way in which steel as found in the environment can produce an inspiration for architecture. In a similar way, the Michael Hopkins cutlery factory for David Mellor in Derbyshire transfers ideas not only about the circular form of the gasholder that formerly stood on the site of the building, but the structural resolution of the clear roof form apparently uses a steel technology related to the bicycle wheel. As Professor Murta comments: "The gasholder had been demolished to ground level but the foundation remained. This foundation had formerly supported a weight of water equivalent to the volume enclosed by a three storey building over its area. It could, therefore, be reused with consequent economy to the project as a whole. There was also the aesthetic virtue that to provide a building on the gasholder site restored the existing relationship between artefact and nature."

The foundation had, therefore, determined the circular form of the building but the client also had a requirement for a clear floor space for manufacturing that was greater in area than the foundation. The solution involved a new reinforced concrete slab that cantilevered almost a metre beyond the edge of the existing foundation. The clear floor space also determined a particular design solution: "The requirements for a space uninterrupted by columns pointed to a clear space roof structure...Additionally the need for a high level of daylight in the building meant that a central lantern would be required of sufficient size and height to give even light, deep in the plan. The concept of a roof apparently floating clear of the enclosing circular structure...became the primary aesthetic objective." The wall is formed of load bearing masonry, stone faced to meet the requirements of the Peak Park Planning Board. Since the wall is used only in compression, some method of eliminating lateral thrust where the trusses which form the roof are carried on the wall had to be devised. The steel trusses themselves span from this wall to the central lantern element to form the necessary uninterrupted floor space. "Lateral thrust is resolved by a tubular steel tension ring at the level of the glazed strip between the top of the wall and the soffit of the roof. It connects the ends of each truss which have been extended to the exterior of the drum. The transfer of load from trusses to the wall is provided for by an inclined truss plate bolted to the cill...The edge of the roof is unencumbered with gutters. Rainwater simply falls into a trench at ground level. There is a generous overhang to the eaves which gives a strong shadow line, visually separating the roof and the drum elements. The careful design of the truss/wall connection is echoed by the detail at the apex of the roof where daylight enters through a lantern mounted over a clerestory. An intricate conical ring truss receives the upper ends of the radial trusses while a central post supports the lantern glazing. The junction of the many trusses with the central ring...not only has to transfer roof and wind loads, but also allows support to the clerestory and receives the upper edge of the roof covering." The constraints on the design problem have produced a solution that uses steel in order to satisfy the structural and functional demands of the building. However, the use of steel also enriches the architecture through the association of images: the circular central lantern support reminds of the structure and form of the bicycle wheel whereas the exposed structure and circular form of the building are obviously related to the original gasholder that preceded the new building. The use of such images allows the architecture a familiarity that is at once both reassuring and stimulating. In the hands of the architect Michael Hopkins, such visual reminders are

coupled with a structural elegance to produce a building that seems at peace with both its purpose and setting.

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Ecobuild 2012 - Life Cycle Analysis presentation

Tata Steel took part in a presentation on Life Cycle Analysis (LCA) at the Ecobuild in London on March 20. Tata Steel sustainability expert John Dowling covered the steel industry view of LCA and why it is vitally important to consider the whole life of buildings from cradle to grave.
Many construction product manufacturers only look at cradle to gate LCA, Dowling said. This short-sighted approach neglects what will happen to a building at the end of its useful life such as the important issues of disposal, recycling and reuse. A recent Building and BD magazine publication The Whole Story showed that 75% of concrete is downcycled into lesser products, such as sub-base, and 58% of timber goes to landfill. These figures compare with 99% of steel being recycled into products with the same or better characteristics and being reused. It is easy to see how greatly endof-life scenarios affect the sustainability profile of a building. Dowlings presentation (Click on the link to the right to view) highlighted the benefit of a cradle-to-grave approach to LCA and how this can be used to identify areas where effort should be placed.

Dowling explained: Analysis of a warehouse, recently carried out as part ofTata Steels Target Zero project, showed that the biggest impact on the carbon footprint of the building is the floor slab and foundations. These findings are important, as much effort in reducing the carbon footprint would otherwise be concentrated on the superstructure and envelope. By carrying out a cradle-to-grave analysis we can identify and concentrate on hot spots to increase sustainable construction. For manufacturers, environmental impacts and how to measure them are a major strategic issue and as designers come under increasing pressure to minimise environmental impacts they will look for manufacturers to provide consistent and robust Life Cycle Assessments. Good cradle-to-grave Life Cycle Assessment will provide an opportunity to differentiate products and improve their commercial value. This is as it should be and good environmental practice gets its rewards.

Ecobuild 2012 - John Dowling presentation

Tata Steel took part in a presentation on Life Cycle Analysis (LCA) at the Ecobuild in London on March 20. Read the steel industry view of LCA and why it is vitally important to consider the whole life of buildings from cradle to grave as presented by Tata Steel sustainability expert John Dowling.

Life Cycle Assessment - The Whole Story: From Cradle to Grave

The Whole Story: From Cradle to Grave was commissioned by Tata Steel and the BCSA and will broaden the ongoing sustainability debate and help engineers and designers to think about the longer-term implication of their choices.
It highlights the shortcomings of most current embodied carbon calculations and encourages a more holistic approach. This means an assessment of the full lifecycle of buildings and materials from Cradle to Grave, rather than a simplified Cradle to Gate method which only considers the energy used to the factory gate and ignores the later burdens and benefits.

The image above and the notes below are extracts from the supplement illustrating what happens to a building's structural frame when it is demolished.

CONCRETE
The great majority of concrete from demolition sites is crushed and used as sub-base or fill. This is downcycling rather than recycling, i.e. a secondary use which is not of the same value as the first. Aggregates from demolition may be re-used in concrete production but its use is restricted both by rules governing maximum percentages allowed and also by supply, since the amount of aggregate that can be recovered for this purpose is limited. Where aggregates are re-used in concrete, new cement, the source of most of the CO2 emitted in concrete production, is still needed.

TIMBER
Definitive information on what happens to timber waste following building demolition is difficult to find. Recent publications from TRADA indicate that up to 80% of timber waste in the UK goes to landfill. Timber can be downcycled by diverting material from the waste stream for the manufacture of chipboard. However, problems with contamination in the waste stream in particular restrict opportunities to divert waste for re-use and recycling.

STEEL
Steel benefits from having a high intrinsic value supported by a well developed and efficient scrap collection infrastructure. It can be recycled at end of life to formproducts that are of the same, or higher, standard and quality as the original material and most steel components are large and easily captured. Capture rates vary depending on the ease of extraction from the demolition site but are always above 90% and average 94% for all steel components. For sections, it is 99%. Obtain a copy of the document electronically or by post by selecting one of the options below.

The Whole Story: From Cradle to Grave

The Whole Story: From Cradle to Grave was commissioned by Tata Steel and the BCSA and will broaden the ongoing sustainability debate and help engineers and designers to think about the longer-term implication of their choices. It highlights the shortcomings of most current embodied carbon calculations and encourages a more holistic approach.

Sustainabilty FAQs
There are many questions that arise when discussing steel and sustainability. Here is a summary of answers to the most frequent questions that we get asked by specifiers.

Sustainability FAQs
Q. Is steel construction sustainable? Q. What are the sustainability benefits of steel during construction? Q. What are the sustainability benefits of steel in operation? Q. What are the sustainability benefits of steel at end of life?

Q. Most construction materials can be recycled, why is steel any different? Q. How much steel is recycled? Q. Should steel be specified by recycled content? Q. What figure should be used as the recycled content of structural steel in the UK? Q. What are the economic sustainable benefits of steel? Q. What are the social sustainable benefits of steel? Q. What is the steel construction industry doing to encourage and support sustainable development? Q. How is Tata Steel tackling climate change? Q. Can the benefit of thermal mass be realised with a steel framed building? Q. What is the carbon footprint of structural steel? Q. Are these values definitive? Q. What is the carbon footprint of the steel fabrication process? Q. Is there a lot of waste material from steel production? Q. How much steel goes into landfill?

Sustainability FAQs
Q. Is steel construction sustainable? A. Steel is arguably the most sustainable of the major structural materials. It has numerous sustainability benefits, which are guaranteed to be realised whenever steel is used. They include: low waste, flexibility, offsite manufacture, speed, resource efficiency, adaptability, demountability, long lasting appeal, safety, reusability and recyclability. These inherent characteristics result in many social, environmental and economic benefits to satisfy sustainabilitys triple bottom line.

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Q. What are the sustainability benefits of steel during construction? A. Steel is a fast, safe construction material. Reduced time on site means lower costs, quicker returns and less disruption to the local community. Steel is manufactured offsite in a safe, factory environment and arrives on site when needed, making it predictable with no unpleasant surprises. There is no site waste and any waste that is generated earlier in the process is easily returned to the steel supply chain. Steel treads lightly on the ground. It has high strength to weight ratio and is resource efficient. Fewer deliveries mean reduced emissions.

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Q. What are the sustainability benefits of steel in operation? A. People like a steel built environment, which is light, open, airy and adaptable. Steel structures mature with age, rather than deteriorate and decay. Steels long clear spans mean that interiors can be changed with ease. Steel frames can readily be adapted and reconfigured to give old buildings a new lease of life. The longevity of a building is fundamental to its overall sustainability.

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Q. What are the sustainability benefits of steel at end of life? A. Steel structures are inherently reusable in full or part. Whole buildings can be taken down and rebuilt elsewhere or individual elements can be reused. An increasing number of buildings are being designed with this in mind, but reuse is an option for steel structures without any special provision. Any steel which is not reused is captured and recycled for further use in construction or elsewhere.

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Q. Most construction materials can be recycled, why is steel any different? A. Most other materials are recycled once to a lesser use. This is referred to as downcycling. Steel can be recycled indefinitely without loss of property or performance. This is referred to as multicycling. It means steel always has a value, which guarantees that virtually none is ever disposed of to landfill. The multicycling of steel is a self-sustaining system that predates modern appreciation of environmental issues and would continue in the unlikely event that they should ever lessen in importance.

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Q. How much steel is recycled? A. Over 500 million tonnes of steel are multicycled worldwide each year equivalent to 180 Eiffel Towers every day. The recovery rates are high. Research shows that 99% of structural steel arising from demolition sites in the UK is recycled or re-used. There is a conservative estimate that over 80% of all steel scrap that becomes available each year is captured and recycled. This figure increases in poorer economies where the relative value of steel is higher.

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Q. Should steel be specified by recycled content? A. Recycled content is a driver to encourage recycling of materials which would otherwise be disposed of. However, it is not a suitable driver for metals that are already recovered and recycled close to their maximum. Specifying recycled content for steel does not have any beneficial environmental effect, but can distort the market and result in unnecessary transport costs and emissions. All steel is recyclable and will be multicycled many times without any artificial stimulus.

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Q. What figure should be used as the recycled content of structural steel in the UK? A. Recycled content varies by process route. Most large scale modern steelmaking processes produce steel with a significant recycled content, as scrap steel is a standard input. When a figure is needed to calculate overall recycled content of a building, the Waste Resource Action Programme (WRAP) recommends applying a value of 60% recycled content for structural steel sourced in the UK. On rare occasions it is possible to manufacture steel without recyclate. For example, direct reduced iron can be charged to an Electric Arc Furnace or a Basic Oxygen Steelmaking plant using plated iron. This is, however, extremely rare.

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Q. What are the economic sustainable benefits of steel? A. It is accepted that, to be sustainable, a solution needs a sound economic basis. Steel is fast, efficient, predictable and safe. Production is highly automated and site operations are not labour intensive. Steel is the cost effective solution and delivers long term value through flexibility, adaptability and lasting appeal.

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Q. What are the social sustainable benefits of steel? A. Steel construction is fast, clean and relatively quiet, so disruption of the community is kept to a minimum. Steel construction is carried out by small teams of skilled workers in a consistent manner which is predictable and safe. Steel is manufactured and fabricated offsite, so workers are stably employed in good conditions. All steel works and major fabrication premises are integrated into their local communities and in the case of the bigger sites are the reason that the community exists. The steel built environment is light, airy, pleasant and popular with people.

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Q. What is the steel construction industry doing to encourage and support sustainable development? A. Tata Steel and the BCSA have recently embarked on a major new initiative to help make zero carbon buildings a reality. The Target Zero project will provide the construction industry with the guidance it needs to meet the emissions reduction targets towards the aspiration of zero carbon by 2019. The 1m Target Zero project will look at five major building types (school, warehouse, office, supermarket and mixed-use development) and will generate fully-costed solutions demonstrating how to achieve the three highest BREEAM ratings and meet the changes to Part L of the Building Regulations. For more information, please visit www.targetzero.info

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Q. How is Tata Steel tackling climate change? A. Tata Steel and our customers are addressing climate change on a local scale by continually making our processes more and more efficient. Since 2000, there has been an 11% reduction in the energy required to produce steel which has contributed to an overall reduction of 50% over the last 40 years. Through optimising the use of process gases arising at our plants, Tata Steel has achieved very high levels of on-site generation of electricity. In 2007, on-site generation produced almost 1,600 GWh of electrical energy. The effect of these efforts is a reduction of approximately 700,000 tonnes of CO2 emissions from the electricity generation sector. Tata Steel is a partner in the Ultra-low CO2Steelmaking (ULCOS) programme, a 360m pan-European initiative to achieve a step change reduction in emissions. As for our own emissions, our long-term climate change goal is to reduce CO 2emissions to less than 1.5 tonnes for every tonne of liquid steel produced by 2020

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Q. Can the benefit of thermal mass be realised with a steel framed building? A. The thermal mass of a building can be used to reduce the requirement for active heating and cooling. People instinctively associate the cool inside churches with their mass, but it has far more to do with the lack of windows and low solar gain along with an absence of heat generating electrical equipment and lighting. Optimum thermal mass is mobilised from the first 100mm thickness of concrete floor slab, which is available in standard steel-framed construction. The extra mass associated with heavier weight structures is a waste, which is compounded by the larger foundations required.

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Q. What is the carbon footprint of structural steel? A. The CO2 emitted during the production of one tonne of structural sections is 0.76 tonnes*. This value is higher than some other structural materials on a tonne by tonne basis, but a tonne of steel goes a great deal further than other materials, so the actual carbon footprint of the structure is lower. The values for all structural steel products are shown below and the calculation method is given at ' the embodied carbon content of steel' Product Sections Tubes Plate
*

Tonnes CO2 per tonne * 0.76 0.857 0.919

The data provided has been generated based on worldsteel data collection and methodology for calculating the LCI for steel products. It is based on the worldsteel Life Cycle Inventory Methodology Report 1999/2000, and data collected and published in 2002.

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Q. Are these values definitive? A. The World Steel Association collects a lot of data, which has been used to calculate the value of 0.76 t/tonne* using the System Expansion methodology, which is the highest ranked method in the ISO 14040 series of standards. There are other values in circulation, some are higher and some are lower than 0.76 t/tonne *. Most are derived by less rigorous methods than System Expansion in an attempt to have a common method for all materials. They are intended to provide a fair comparison, but do not take account of steels unique environmental qualities. The calculation method is given in ' the embodied carbon content of steel' * The data provided has been generated based on worldsteel data collection and methodology for calculating the LCI for steel products. It is based on the worldsteel Life Cycle Inventory Methodology Report 1999/2000, and data collected and published in 2002.

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Q. What is the carbon footprint of the steel fabrication process? A. This is something that each fabricator must determine for their operations. The British Constructional Steelwork Association (BCSA) has developed a common methodology for calculating the carbon footprint of the steel fabrication process. Initial evidence from a selection of carbon footprinting assessments indicates that the answer will generally be of the order of 0.3 tonnes CO2 per tonne of fabricated steelwork.

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Q. Is there a lot of waste material from steel production? A. Tata Steels processes have been refined over many years to ensure that the consumption of materials within them is optimised. Although a high level of conversion efficiency is achieved, a small amount of waste will inevitably be generated. The vast majority of ferrous waste is re-incorporated immediately back into the steel production

chain. Uses have been found for many of the other wastes and by-products in other sectors of industry. For example about 3 million tonnes of ground granulated blast furnace slag (GGBS) is used annually as a cement replacement, which helps to reduce the high carbon footprint of concrete.

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Q. How much steel goes into landfill? A. Almost no steel or indeed any metal is ever intentionally wasted. It is too valuable. Throwing away metal is like throwing away money. A recent survey indicated that no more than 1% of structural steel ever goes to landfill. The rest is multicycled indefinitely. A full listing of end-of-life parameters can be found at 'end of life parameters'.

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Construction Services and Development

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Sustainability
The steel sector is delighted to be leading the way in developing a more sustainable construction industry. Go there

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