An innovative construction system made from local Mediterranean natural resources
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Urban and population growth or recurrent natural disasters threaten the conservation and resilience of natural resources. Socio-economic challenges, such as rural depopulation and unemployment, are shared throughout many worldwide regions, among them the Mediterranean area in the South- West of Europe. Although the area of forests in this region is above 30%, it is a net wood importer because forest operations are too expensive for the current wood prices. Hence, not harvested wood accumulates in forests increasing the risks of natural disasters such as wildfires. Pine wood and cork in the Mediterranean Europe are local natural resources whose technical characteristics make them excellent raw materials for construction. Wood is not simply a light biological material whose processes of industrial transformation and production emit less greenhouse gas emissions than its competitors, but it also stores atmospheric carbon. The impact of the local construction sector could be reduced employing these natural resources. This article presents an ecological construction system based on natural biological materials to improve energy efficiency in public buildings. This system consists of interconnected panels made of indigenous biological resources. Its design facilitates the assembly and disassembly for reuse, extending service life and reducing the costs of demolition energy and waste. In south-western Europe there are few wooden buildings in comparison to other European regions. Therefore, it is where the potential climate change mitigation through the substitution of materials is maximized. The collaboration between specialists from these territories will allow the development of a sandwich panel made of local wood and cork. The proposed pilot actions will demonstrate the benefits of their use encouraging the replication of solutions and policies to foster the use of local biological resources to improve the energy efficiency of buildings throughout their life cycle.
Keywords: Wood-based construction; cork; climate change mitigation; circular economy; rural bioeconomy
ID: 3484680