upcycling concrete rubble

Despite the enormous emissions and raw materials needed to produce concrete, healthy structures made of concrete are demolished daily under the jaws of hydraulic excavators and energy-intensive crushers. We propose to upcycle large irregular concrete rubble pieces from demolition sites into walls with the help of digital tools and through minimal material processing.

Wall 2.2m x 2.7m built using large irregular concrete rubble pieces with the help of a digitally-hacked crane and a drill mounted on a robotic arm – credits : Maxence Grangeot – SXL & CRLC – EPFL

Our real-scale demonstrators are walls of approx. 2.5m tall, 2.7m long, 30cm thick, built out of large “off the pile” concrete rubble pieces. Digital tools are used to harness the geometrical complexity inherent to found irregular concrete rubble pieces and to precisely assemble them into a slender yet stable wall. Due to its commodity and environmental potential, using unaltered concrete rubble as a new construction material hints at new possibilities for circular construction.

Scientific paper:

Rising from rubble – Leveraging existing construction tools for upcycling concrete waste into slender walls

M. Grangeot; Q. Wang; K. Beyer; C. Fivet; S. Parascho

2024-05-24. ROB|ARCH Robotic Fabrication in Architecture, Art, and Design, Toronto, Canada, May 21-25, 2024.

Detailed record

Full text

From concrete waste to walls: An investigation of reclamation and digital technologies for new load-bearing structures

M. Grangeot; C. Fivet; S. Parascho

2023. cisbat 2023 The Built Environment in Transition, Lausanne, Switzerland, September 13-15, 2023. p. 192019. DOI : 10.1088/1742-6596/2600/19/192019.

Detailed record

Full text – View at publisher

Latest demonstrator

Earlier demonstrator

Sourcing

sourcing: loading rubbles for transportation

sourcing: bin of rubbles for construction

Design process

2D stock of rubbles considered for packing

stacking options, algorithm developped by Qiainqing Wang (EESD, EPFL)

rubble #01 contour from LabView edge detection

rubble #02 contour from LabView edge detection

rubble #03 contour from LabView edge detection

Construction process

fabrication process: inserting lifting anchors

fabrication process: positioning rubbles with lifting anchors

fabrication process: repositioning rubbles with spansets

fabrication process: lifting with anchors normal to surface

fabrication process: anchoring base rubble with mortar foot

Tools

tools: lasers, camera and computer for digitizing a gantry

tools: gantry remote with ethernet and power supply connectivity

tools: custom-made reversible lifting anchors

tools: scale on gantry hook and sliding spanset

Research by Maxence Grangeot

With the supervision of:

Prof. Corentin Fivet (SXL)

Prof. Stefana Parascho (CRCL)

With the support of :

SXL: Dr. Maléna Bastien-Masse

EESD: Qianqing Wang, Prof. Katrin Beyer

GIS: Gilles Guignet, Luca Mari, Frédérique Dubugnon, Gregory Spirlet

Tinguely: Benjamin Mamzer

Sika: Cédric Chetelat

keywords: circular economy, reuse, concrete, rubble, debris, demolition, waste, recycling, upcycling, cement, local, material, digital, tools, construction, industry, academia, scientific, research

mots clés : économie circulaire, réutilisation, réemploi, béton, gravats, débris, démolition, déchets, recyclage, upcycling, ciment, local, matériau, numérique, outils, construction, industrie, académie, recherche, scientifique