Design & production optimisation of a novel low embodied carbon concrete structural beam solution

这个封闭的项目是由一家建筑行业初创公司（净零项目-“NZP”）提出的，该公司对混凝土梁、板和框架等更可持续的结构工程产品有一个愿景。目前，建筑行业生产混凝土梁的方法倾向于简化制造过程。实际上，矩形的形式工作（细长的盒子）是按照要求的尺寸生产的，然后将混凝土倒入形式中以固定固体。然而，这是非常浪费的，很大一部分混凝土梁的体积为梁提供了有限的强度，因此与混凝土和生产过程相关的大部分碳足迹都被浪费掉了。NZP为“优化”混凝土梁提供了一个激进的解决方案，它结合了3D混凝土打印、智能结构设计和钢索，大大减少了生产混凝土梁所需的混凝土、钢筋和嵌入碳的数量。迄今为止，NZP已经开发并生产了一种3D打印混凝土梁，与类似的传统混凝土梁相比，它可以减少70%的隐含碳，减少高达50%的材料成本。建筑行业的客户对NZP有商业兴趣。然而，目前NZP只能生产出适合两端支撑的梁。为了在商业上可行，该公司需要生产悬臂梁（即仅在一侧支撑的梁）。这是可能的，但只有开发一些专业的自动化设计软件和悬臂梁设计的实验测试。随附的快速启动创新应用程序将使NZP能够解决这些挑战，并利用对低碳结构工程产品的商业需求。该项目完全符合“实现净零和减少环境影响”的竞争重点。

The enclosed project is presented by a construction sector startup company (Net Zero Projects - "NZP") that has a vision for more sustainable structural engineered products e.g. concrete beams, slabs and frames.At present the construction sector produces concrete beams based on methods that are biassed toward simplified manufacturing processes. In effect, rectangular form work (elongated boxes) are produced in the required size and then concrete is poured into the form to set solid. However, this is very wasteful, a good proportion of the volume of the concrete beam provides limited strength to the beam so a large proportion of the carbon footprint, associated with concrete and production process, is emitted wastefully.NZP has a radical solution for an "optimised" concrete beam that combines 3D concrete printing, intelligent structural design and steel cables to drastically reduce the amount of concrete, reinforcing steel and embedded carbon needed to produce a concrete beam. To date, NZP has developed and produced a 3D printed concrete beam that provides 70% reduction in embodied carbon and up to 50% reduction in material costs, compared to similar traditional concrete beams.NZP has had commercial interest from construction sector clients. However, at present NZP can only produce a beam suitable for being supported at both ends. To be commercially viable, the company needs to produce cantilever beams (i.e. beams only supported on one side). This is possible but only with the development of some specialist automated design software and experimental testing of cantilever beam designs.The enclosed Fast Start Innovation application will enable NZP to resolve these challenges and exploit commercial demand for lower carbon structural engineered products. This project is fully aligned with the "Achieving net zero and reducing environmental impact" competition priority.