The Netherlands has the scoop: building with waste wood. On June 27, The Urban Woods turned the first screw in a solid building plate for their modular homes. This 'breakthrough for CO₂ issues' is the result of chain-wide collaboration.
From waste mountain to residential tower
The Urban Woods Delft is a high-tech apartment complex with 10 floors for the middle segment. There is hardly any concrete. Even the core and the elevator shaft are made of wood. Partly recycled. They have treated it in such a way that it will last for centuries. “Bizarre” exclaims Tim Vermeend, co-founder of The Urban Woods, enthusiastically. “A mountain of 1 billion pallets was thrown away every year and now… we're just going to live in it!”
Dutch Glory
The cross-glued wooden panels, C-CLT, consist of discarded pallets and demolition wood. The outer layer is ash wood (special: no coniferous wood). All from the Netherlands. The thick solid wooden panels that are created comply with European regulations, reduce CO₂ emissions and are of course circular; it is even 'up-cycling': low-quality wood becomes a high-quality building product. The plates are 10 to 15% stronger than traditional CLT. They seem to be a precursor to the organic construction transition. After all, the government will allocate 200 million in the coming years to stimulate bio-based construction.
Special collaboration
This “milestone” is the result of a chain-wide Dutch collaboration. Staatsbosbeheer selects the ash wood from their forest, while social development company DZB Leiden prepares the waste wood from residual flows. Then it comes: Wood Joint finger-welds the planks, BoerBoom turns the planks into solid panels, the Urban Climate Architects designs, TNO provides thorough research into, among other things, detecting metal parts, bonding and strength classification, the Province of South Holland co-finances and The Urban Woods handles the wood and… builds. “Only together can we set the new standard.”
Scalable, social and local
The makers expect to make entire buildings from waste wood in the future. Building with it is scalable, affordable and requires no imports. Everything local. The process is currently being scaled up with the world's first C-CLT vacuum press for recycled wood. “One small turn of a screw, but a turning point for the construction transition,” the partners joke during the screw ceremony at The Urban Woods headquarters. When this one small screw was screwed in, the construction sector was fully represented.
Source: The Urban Woods
