[+] Innovation is Construction’s Only Saviour, Industry Warned

A West Australian engineering firm was in Melbourne late last month to oversee a concrete pour on a house build in a big masterplanned housing estate at Melton, about 35km west of the capital. That there was a concrete slab being poured by Hermitage Home builders for a four-bedroom house on the 215-lot Skylark Rise estate was not unusual. In fact, at least a half-a-dozen concrete mixers were backed up against an equal number of boom concrete pumps in the 17.4ha estate’s neighbouring streets, grano workers guiding the huge arms across reinforced steel, while others sifted through the mix with vibrators or hurriedly levelled the pour. What was unusual, however, is that on Lot 435 in Uplands Crescent the heavy rubber nozzle on the giant concrete boom was being guided back and forth across hundreds of large cardboard boxes. On all the other neighbouring job sites the waffle pods—the blocks used in the industry as void fillers in slabs to lower building costs by reducing the amount of concrete—are made from expanded polystyrene (EPS) foam. It’s taken three years, but on that pour, Waffle Foundations director Mick Young saw the concrete slab of a Melbourne house laid on top of his cardboard pods. ▲ Waffle Foundations director Mick Young on site in Melbourne. (All images Gemma Swain, Onvibe Photography) Young had flown in from Perth the night before, arriving on site to discover there’d been heavy overnight rain in Melton South. While the morning had brought bright sunshine, thousands of tiny beads of rain still clung to the special waterproof treatment on the boxes. He wasn’t concerned. Rain was one of the early problems the newly registered company has had to solve for. Initially, metal clips had held the corners together but often allowed in water, softening the interlocking cardboard ribs that fit inside the box and reducing their strength. Visy—the Australian-made global packaging and recycling giant—worked with Young’s team to solve the problem, effectively redesigning the waffle pod like a cake box, with folding corners that lock in place. The cardboard pods have been weight-tested to a tonne. And Visy is manufacturing them from recycled paper and cardboard, whereas, while some organisms are able to degrade polystyrene, it’s generally considered non-biodegradable. Disposed of improperly, the foam can leach chemicals into the environment. “From a cost perspective, it seems like the polystyrene may be a fraction cheaper at the moment,” Young says. “But that’s only because we’re at the trial stage. Once we get the cost benefits of much bigger production runs, more efficient delivery—you might be able to deliver to 10 sites at once—then our cost should come down to match the polystyrene.” ▲ It had rained the night before, but the cardboard pods are covered with a waterproof coating. Concerned there might be resistance from grano workers, Waffle Foundations used four trucks to deliver pre-assembled pods to the Uplands Crescent site. “In future we want to flat-pack the pods to the site where they will be assembled, because the whole concept is to make it as environmentally friendly as we can,” he said. “And they’ve told us it wasn’t that much more difficult than putting polystyrene down … pretty much the same concept.” Last month’s test showed Waffle Foundations they need to make quarter, half and three-quarter sized boxes, to save installers having to cut into the standard pods for tight corners. Young’s cardboard pods are the kinds of innovations the Building 4.0 Cooperative Research Centre (CRC)—an industry-led research initiative co-funded by the Australian Government—wants to see more of. And wants to see more money going towards. CRC chief executive Professor Mathew Aitchison says Australia’s existing high-cost, low-tech building sector—employing around 1.4 million people and along with property representing about 13 per cent of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP)—is an ideal target for the disruption that many experts say is heading towards the industry. ▲ Professor Mathew Aitchison of the Building 4.0 Cooperative Research Centre. Speaking at the organisation’s annual housing innovation showcase at Monash University, Aitchison said the industry’s woes were a direct result of a 70-year decline in productivity. “But when the rivers of gold were flowing five years ago, and you were literally printing money with the developments that you were making, how much of that money did you put aside for innovation?” he asked. The answer, he said, was none. “So, a few things that I can say with 100 per cent certainty about the future, is that things will definitely not improve if we don’t put effort into innovation,” he told an audience of several hundred. “And there is no path to the future for this industry or for the housing problems that we’re experiencing that does not pass through the station of innovation.” Outside the forum, Aitchison told The Urban Developer the government had a major role to play in building “a culture of innovation”. ▲ The Interim Dean of the Faculty of Art, Design and Architecture at Monash, Professor Mel Dodd with a model of pre-fabricated housing solutions for bushfire and disaster relief. “I think they need to backstop and underwrite an innovation program,” he says. “I find it interesting and somewhat astounding to know that, as a country, we don’t have a national plan for what building innovation will look like. “Instead, what we seem to be engaged in at the moment is putting out a series of spot fires as they emerge.” Aitchison argues such a program needs to include new materials that are more sustainable and environmentally friendly, better, more appropriate housing designs in the places where people want to live, building systems that come together like magic and are fast and highly efficient, and new business models and housing delivery approaches that could take out intermediaries and flatten value chains. “It is really about having a program that would enable us to do innovation in an ongoing way,” he said. “We don’t have that currently…it’s very stop-start.” ▲ An exhibit by RMIT’s School of Architecture and Urban Design in collaboration with the Fishermans Bend Taskforce showing the potential for increased density across six key sites. 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[+] Innovation is Construction’s Only Saviour, Industry Warned

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