GBF17 Green Building Festival: Kevin Flanagan, PLP Architecture - Opening Keynote

[00:00:00] So I'd like to welcome Kevin Flanagan. Kevin is a partner at PLP Architecture and an architect [00:00:15] with 30 years of experience establishing a reputation for award-winning design through [00:00:20] major world-class cities. His design solutions resolve both city and context in the environmental [00:00:28] concerns in a single bold concept. His designs are a response to the nature of place. Among [00:00:36] other projects, Kevin is currently working on PLP's Timber Tower research project together [00:00:43] with the University of Cambridge. The feasibility proposals imagine the future development of [00:00:50] laminated timber tall buildings in central London, adding an 80-storey, 300-meter tower, [00:00:56] and additional levels of housing to the Barbican complex. So please welcome Kevin Flanagan. [00:01:03] Kevin Flanagan: Okay, thank you very much. I'll just start off here. I'm going to be talking [00:01:18] about two aspects. The first I'm going to be speaking about one of the projects. I've got models here called [00:01:24] Leeds in Amsterdam. It last year won the world's most sustainable project according to BREEAM, which is comparable, a little bit better actually, than LEED. [00:01:35] And I also wanted to mention that it's very wonderful to be here. C'est très bon d'être invité, and I hope everyone can speak French, because the rest of the talk will be in French. [00:01:47] Kevin Flanagan: Now, I have been around for a while, and I grew up in Montreal, and of course, [00:01:54] my experience of architecture and design really had to do with pavilions and looking to the future, how disappointed I was ten years later, you know, finding out that most of the buildings of the world were not quite as wonderful as these. [00:02:06] Kevin Flanagan: But certainly Canada has inspired a lot of my design work, and you can see the wonderful painting here by Lauren Harris, and that's imitated in some ways by the tower that's in The Hague that won an international high-rise award. [00:02:20] Kevin Flanagan: And I also worked with James Wines on the Expo 86 highway pavilion, which was in Vancouver. So Canada has been a significant part of my career in architecture. [00:02:32] Kevin Flanagan: This is our office. We have about 200 people. It's in Tower Hill. We have an open office in the sense that you can come and visit anytime you want. We're happy to show you things and show our model shop and discuss architecture generally. [00:02:43] Kevin Flanagan: Now, we're known not just in Europe, but internationally for one project, notably The Edge, which is models here. And if you have time, or even now, you can come up and just have a browse and look at them. [00:02:55] Kevin Flanagan: It's good to stand up and walk around a little bit if you're wanting. So here's the project as it is. There's an animation involved as well. [00:03:04] Kevin Flanagan: Well, basically what this does is re-envision how the office is intended to work. The client, which was OVG, quite a forward-seeking developer, was wanting a new type of building that they could eventually sell, and also to become a headquarters to Deloitte. [00:03:22] Kevin Flanagan: But what's interesting after it was completed was that they monitored, they have about 30,000 monitors through the building, so they could really understand how people use the building. [00:03:31] Kevin Flanagan: And what became evident to them was that people were using the building not in a traditional way as expected. [00:03:36] Kevin Flanagan: That young people today, because they have, let me show you the wonderful Mr. iPhone, basically computer in your pocket, that people network in a completely different way. [00:03:48] Kevin Flanagan: And in fact, people have been taught through schooling to work together in a way that was unconventional at the time that I was going to school. [00:03:56] Kevin Flanagan: So people congregate in these social spaces that we've created in a way that's phenomenal. [00:04:02] Kevin Flanagan: And people don't want to work necessarily at Deloitte, but they want to work in the building, which is something you should think about, because it changes what we do. [00:04:12] Kevin Flanagan: Welcome to The Edge. [00:04:17] Kevin Flanagan: This is certifiably the greenest office building in the world. [00:04:22] Kevin Flanagan: But that just... [00:04:24] Kevin Flanagan: ...part about it, because The Edge in Amsterdam is also possibly the most connected office space in the world. [00:04:32] Kevin Flanagan: Working at The Edge is insane. [00:04:36] Kevin Flanagan: It all starts with a smartphone app developed by the building's main tenant, the consulting firm Deloitte. [00:04:43] Kevin Flanagan: When you arrive at The Edge, a camera recognizes you by your license plate for automatic access. [00:04:49] Kevin Flanagan: And because it's The Netherlands, there are chargers available for electric cars. [00:04:53] Kevin Flanagan: Inside, things start to get interesting, because you don't have a desk. [00:05:02] Kevin Flanagan: No one here does. [00:05:03] Kevin Flanagan: Workspaces are assigned to you based on your schedule for the day. [00:05:06] Kevin Flanagan: You have options. [00:05:08] Kevin Flanagan: A work booth, a meeting room, what they call a concentration room, a sitting desk, a standing desk, a balcony desk. [00:05:15] Kevin Flanagan: You can even just hang out in the sun-filled atrium all day. [00:05:18] Kevin Flanagan: This concept is called hot desking, and it's what allows Deloitte to have 2,500 workers, but less than half as many desks at its Dutch headquarters. [00:05:29] Kevin Flanagan: The app knows your preferences, and when you arrive at your workspace, the lights dim or brighten based on your stored settings. [00:05:36] Kevin Flanagan: And any of the building's massive flat screens can be instantly paired with an iPhone or a laptop. [00:05:42] Kevin Flanagan: So what makes all this possible? [00:05:47] Kevin Flanagan: The LED light panels developed by Philips specifically for the edge are actually powered by low-voltage Ethernet cables, [00:05:56] Kevin Flanagan: which means every light in the building becomes its own Internet-connected data hub with 28,000 sensors that makes the building and its users smarter. [00:06:06] Kevin Flanagan: The building becomes a very important part of who we are and what we want to be, [00:06:10] Kevin Flanagan: and we've actually seen in recruitment that more people are now spontaneously coming to Deloitte because they want to work in this building. [00:06:19] Kevin Flanagan: Oh yeah, and then there's these. The building has solar on the roof and on the south-facing wall, [00:06:25] Kevin Flanagan: enough to power the building and all of the electric cars, computers, and smartphones used by its employees. [00:06:31] Kevin Flanagan: And those employees are kept warm by two enormous boreholes tunneling more than 400 feet down beneath the building. [00:06:40] Kevin Flanagan: During the summer, the edge pumps warm water deep into the aquifer, where it sits insulated until it can be sucked back out in the winter to warm the building. [00:06:50] Kevin Flanagan: Outside there are beehive towers and bat homes to support the local pollinators, [00:06:56] Kevin Flanagan: and even the rainwater is collected to flush the toilets and irrigate the gardens. [00:07:01] Kevin Flanagan: We are planning to build a lot more buildings like these and the next one will be smarter and the one after that will be smarter as well. [00:07:10] Kevin Flanagan: And we won't stop until all cities in the world are filled with buildings that are intelligent and that are not using any energy anymore. [00:07:17] Kevin Flanagan: In the end, we will actually need less buildings in the world, but the buildings that are there will be used in a better way, [00:07:23] Kevin Flanagan: will be more efficient and will be using a lot less energy than in the past. [00:07:31] Kevin Flanagan: Sometimes the edge just feels like it's showing off and some of the app functionality isn't quite ready for prime time yet. [00:07:38] Kevin Flanagan: But most of the time, this is all running seamlessly in the background. [00:07:43] Kevin Flanagan: It's maybe the most fully realized vision of the internet of things the world has ever seen. [00:07:51] Kevin Flanagan: Another day at the edge comes to an end. [00:07:53] Kevin Flanagan: A custom security robot that looks a bit like R2D2 wakes up and begins its patrols. [00:07:59] Kevin Flanagan: Now, if only the app could automagically come conjure up a nice dinner recipe, [00:08:04] Kevin Flanagan: maybe provide all the fresh ingredients at the end of the day to get you cooking. [00:08:08] Kevin Flanagan: No surprise, the edge has that too. [00:08:12] Kevin Flanagan: Bon Appetit. [00:08:21] Kevin Flanagan: Okay. [00:08:22] Kevin Flanagan: So what this really is, is looking at a building as a social space. [00:08:26] Kevin Flanagan: And of course there are a lot of the features that are mentioned that provided us enough of the profile [00:08:32] Kevin Flanagan: to gain a wonderful accounting by Bream. [00:08:37] Kevin Flanagan: But one of the things that's really important for architects is the fact that we're really trying [00:08:42] Kevin Flanagan: to find new ways to provide spaces that enervate young people to work in the building. [00:08:48] Kevin Flanagan: And really increase productivity in a sense because people who are happier work more collectively, [00:08:54] Kevin Flanagan: more collegially. [00:08:56] Kevin Flanagan: And a lot of the things that we're discussing have a lot to do with how we see ourselves and the building form. [00:09:03] Kevin Flanagan: Very often, and even today, people think of buildings as static objects. [00:09:09] Kevin Flanagan: But what if we thought of the buildings as things that produce energy, that create new ideas, [00:09:14] Kevin Flanagan: that try to promote the sharing of ideas through the building. [00:09:18] Kevin Flanagan: And that's really the idea of the plan form as we have it. [00:09:21] Kevin Flanagan: Deloitte and the other companies that are in the building spend a lot of time on the road. [00:09:27] Kevin Flanagan: So face time within the building is very critical for them to create a sense of community and spirit. [00:09:33] Kevin Flanagan: And so when we looked also at all the registers for Bream, [00:09:38] Kevin Flanagan: they were quite extensive and we've hit all those goals and made quite a success of them. [00:09:43] Kevin Flanagan: The developer and industry and Deloitte were very proactive in trying to move the building technology forward to their advantage. [00:09:53] Kevin Flanagan: Because if they thought if they could create a building as a showcase for this type of technology, [00:09:58] Kevin Flanagan: they could export that technology to others and become consultants for this type of new building. [00:10:05] Kevin Flanagan: Now, OVG is quite bright, so they've taken this notion where this building actually produces more energy than it uses, [00:10:11] Kevin Flanagan: and are thinking of building a village where the energy that's created for themselves could be shared with other buildings of different uses. [00:10:19] Kevin Flanagan: You probably know hotel rooms need heating and office buildings need cooling. [00:10:24] Kevin Flanagan: So if you can create a mixed use development of sorts and also phases of time change between uses and different types of uses. [00:10:31] Kevin Flanagan: So it's an interesting project. [00:10:34] Kevin Flanagan: The plan form was really developed as of right. [00:10:38] Kevin Flanagan: This is plan form that's created by virtue of the fact that it's going to the limit of the site. [00:10:43] Kevin Flanagan: When we looked at the form at 18 meter bars, which is the span, the clear span that was possible with precast panels and flat floors, [00:10:51] Kevin Flanagan: we noticed some dark areas and those are the cores, as you'd expect. [00:10:55] Kevin Flanagan: But for me it's a bit like an open hand, that it's something that's opening to the sunlight. [00:10:59] Kevin Flanagan: There's north light, but also from that vantage point there are views of the highway, the trams and trains that are moving. [00:11:06] Kevin Flanagan: The airports just a little bit off to the left, but also you see old Amsterdam as well off into the distance. [00:11:13] Kevin Flanagan: So it's quite a glorious positioning. [00:11:16] Kevin Flanagan: And there's the green space in the center. [00:11:19] Kevin Flanagan: And the slides have all gone weird. [00:11:22] Kevin Flanagan: Great. [00:11:24] Kevin Flanagan: And there's that central space again. [00:11:26] Kevin Flanagan: These are views of it you've just seen very well. [00:11:28] Kevin Flanagan: The notion that the phone is driving a lot of this new technology as well and therefore can be monitored. [00:11:34] Kevin Flanagan: Now every person in the building voted to allow this type of information to be made available. [00:11:39] Kevin Flanagan: And really it means that some of the building floors are actually closed down at certain times of the day or during a whole day. [00:11:47] Kevin Flanagan: On Fridays in Holland, half the day is a work day. [00:11:51] Kevin Flanagan: So a lot of the building actually is vacated, a lot of the floors. [00:11:55] Kevin Flanagan: And also that means for a tenant, they don't use the floor and therefore they don't require cleaning and that sort of thing. [00:12:02] Kevin Flanagan: So that's an advantage in monitoring for the client. [00:12:05] Kevin Flanagan: It won the Urban Land Institute Award. [00:12:08] Kevin Flanagan: I'm putting these out just to show that we're in the media. [00:12:11] Kevin Flanagan: And all the other awards that we've won. [00:12:14] Kevin Flanagan: AIA awards and Brianne, et cetera, et cetera. [00:12:17] Kevin Flanagan: Now the second building I'm going to go through really quickly. [00:12:20] Kevin Flanagan: This is under development. [00:12:21] Kevin Flanagan: And it's the first well building registered in London, which is interesting because a well is not necessarily something that's promoted. [00:12:32] Kevin Flanagan: But for us what's interesting is that it's the notion that the building has components that could be made to work together in an integrated way and promote the notion of interaction between people. [00:12:46] Kevin Flanagan: One of the disadvantages of having a phone is that you tend to live in a silo. [00:12:50] Kevin Flanagan: And to be able to bring people together and exchange ideas really is fundamental to the way that London used to work. [00:12:57] Kevin Flanagan: London had wonderful cafes and in those cafes people who had been out to sea would be able to exchange ideas of where the marketplaces were and that sort of thing. [00:13:07] Kevin Flanagan: That idea of being able to make an exchange of ideas and move technology forward is something that's really fundamental to this notion. [00:13:16] Kevin Flanagan: And here's the ground level with a lot of amenity floors as well on the lower levels for food. [00:13:23] Kevin Flanagan: The next thing is sort of future proofing towers and transport. [00:13:28] Kevin Flanagan: The notion is that the building itself is integrated fully into a very large transport exchange. [00:13:34] Kevin Flanagan: I don't think you have any of these in Canada. [00:13:36] Kevin Flanagan: I think in Montreal they're probably somewhere. [00:13:38] Kevin Flanagan: You have high speed trains linking to local trains and express route trains all in one particular position. [00:13:46] Kevin Flanagan: Now what happens if all those people could be fed vertically into a tower? [00:13:50] Kevin Flanagan: And that was the notion here. [00:13:51] Kevin Flanagan: And we're continuing to study this notion here. [00:13:55] Kevin Flanagan: And this was in China as a proposal. [00:13:57] Kevin Flanagan: It's not meant to be a building. [00:13:58] Kevin Flanagan: All it's meant to be is to illustrate a race track and the notion that the building form could be generated from the movement of the individual pods that circle the building. [00:14:08] Kevin Flanagan: These are about the size of a bus, a small bus. [00:14:11] Kevin Flanagan: And you can see this again as an illustration. [00:14:14] Kevin Flanagan: And that won an award very recently as well for transportation. [00:14:20] Kevin Flanagan: Now most recently we're looking at something called car tube. [00:14:23] Kevin Flanagan: And this is where it may be of interest to Toronto. [00:14:26] Kevin Flanagan: Of course I used to live here. [00:14:27] Kevin Flanagan: But coming back 25, 30 years later I'm sort of thinking well what has gone on in Toronto? [00:14:32] Kevin Flanagan: What are the high points and low points? [00:14:34] Kevin Flanagan: And what could we as architects and designers and urban planners think of as solutions to problems that are at hand? [00:14:43] Kevin Flanagan: And one of the things I found of course is that Torontonians spent a lot of time in transit. [00:14:49] Kevin Flanagan: Phenomenal amount of time. [00:14:52] Kevin Flanagan: So how could we make that better? [00:14:54] Kevin Flanagan: And how could we make the city better? [00:14:56] Kevin Flanagan: For us we see the world as moving towards cities. [00:15:00] Kevin Flanagan: So how could we make cities better, people's lives better? [00:15:04] Kevin Flanagan: And this notion is to take the new technology of autonomous vehicles [00:15:10] Kevin Flanagan: and try to optimize it and allow platooning of the cars. [00:15:14] Kevin Flanagan: So in other words instead of having a six lane 401 highway, why don't we just take all of the cars that can [00:15:20] Kevin Flanagan: and put them in one straight string of pearls and allow them to move together. [00:15:26] Kevin Flanagan: You could increase speeds, increase safety. [00:15:30] Kevin Flanagan: And this is possible with new technology. [00:15:33] Kevin Flanagan: [00:15:40] Kevin Flanagan: [00:15:43] Kevin Flanagan: [00:15:50] Kevin Flanagan: [00:15:56] Kevin Flanagan: [00:16:18] Kevin Flanagan: [00:16:24] Kevin Flanagan: [00:16:46] Kevin Flanagan: [00:16:48] Kevin Flanagan: [00:16:51] They go and walk through parks, and they've developed parks really for perambulating. [00:16:57] It allows people the chance they realize to think. [00:17:01] And even in ancient literature, you'll hear of somebody saying, [00:17:05] oh, well, the place that I really do all of my thinking is walking in the park. [00:17:11] And parkland has a phenomenal impact on people's sense of self and socialization. [00:17:19] And the notion here is that we create very narrow boreholes through the underground at about three or four meters. [00:17:28] And at this diameter, a very small diameter, they're exceptionally cost effective [00:17:34] because the loading is so much less, and the hydrostatic pressures are so much less. [00:17:40] And with autonomous cars, there isn't a concern about the exhaust and things. [00:17:44] So here's Paris as an example, London as an example. [00:17:48] Again, this is an illustration of how CarTube would work. [00:17:52] Only cars that have this autonomous ability would be made to work. [00:17:57] A lot of the cities of the world are grids, and what we're really talking about is networking these cities [00:18:02] so that you can go from position A to position B through the most optimal route possible for your destination. [00:18:11] Now, in New York, Central Times Square could be like this. [00:18:15] But in Toronto, oddly enough, why is it not looking like this? [00:18:19] Is there any reason? [00:18:20] Somebody could tell me why? [00:18:24] Now, when we look at Toronto, I used to live here, of course, and I know a lot about the way that the city had grown [00:18:29] and how the major railways had given a distinct flavor to the patterning of the city. [00:18:34] Everything moves and is a move from east to west and along the coastline, the shoreline. [00:18:42] But what is also interesting is that some of these highways that were built years ago are still in existence, [00:18:48] and they physically break the ability of people who live in the city to get to the shoreline, [00:18:54] and it's somewhat of a disadvantage in most European cities and even in Boston. [00:19:00] They've recently dug quite large tunnels, but using, of course, old technology and old ideas of where cars go [00:19:06] and what type of cars they really are. [00:19:08] If we can use electric cars, then it's very possible to make something like this work. [00:19:14] You probably know of examples in New York where even highways have been turned into gardens. [00:19:22] But the notion in Toronto would be that, potentially, you could reclaim that shoreline for the general public [00:19:27] and create places for breathing and relaxation, which are essential to cities. [00:19:33] This is another project. We've just won a Best Building Award here. [00:19:36] We're using timber, and this is the largest use of CLT timber in the UK and one of the largest in Europe. [00:19:44] So now I'm going to go on to timber projects, particularly, and I hope I've got enough time. [00:19:49] Globally, buildings are responsible about 30%. It varies depending on the parameters that you use. [00:19:55] Interestingly, some developers are very much keen on trying to meet the Paris Accords, [00:20:01] and one of them is a land lease. [00:20:05] In Europe, just to show you what's happening there, is that, of course, there are immediate concerns that they have in London. [00:20:11] There is a Thames barrier, and it's really been used much now, is used much more so than was ever intended. [00:20:17] About 90% of the world's wind is created in Europe, wind energy. [00:20:22] And one of the things that's also interesting, in Paris, people perambulate quite a bit, walking in cities and that sort of thing. [00:20:28] And there's a notion of trying to make the walking surfaces potentially solar gain, or also I've seen energy created through pressure pads very recently. [00:20:39] But automation is something that's keenly being developed in Europe, and that leads on to our project, the timber tower. [00:20:48] In North America, very different, in the way that people have used cities, they were at the beginning of Canada's history about 80% of the people actually lived in the countries and only 20% of the cities because they were central trading hubs. [00:21:08] As we move now to our century, we're finding just the reverse, and this is true over all of North America, that there's a centralization, compaction that's happening within city cores. [00:21:22] So, where did all the people go? [00:21:23] Well, they came to cities, and where are all the people going to be in the next so many years, 40 years? [00:21:31] The population is going to double in major urban cities throughout the world, in about 150 large cities of the world, you're going to have a huge amount of congestion. [00:21:42] And the notion of creating livable cities is going to become the most important because if people do not feel at ease in the cities that they live and feel that they will move. [00:21:54] And in some cases, cities in the Far East are actually planning to move themselves cities of five million, they're planning to build alternative cities because of the difficulties that they have in sort of retrofitting the older cities. [00:22:11] Population growth is always an issue, and by the time we finish this talk, there will be 200 new people added to the planet, so in 40, 45 minutes. [00:22:21] And, of course, we've reached that threshold where half the population live in cities, and so much of the pollution is created by humans, but also as we collectively increase as a species on the planet, what will tend to happen is our CO2 profile will increase globally. [00:22:42] And so we're talking about saving CO2, in fact, what we should also be discussing is how we can create negative CO2, how we can sequester the CO2, and that probably is going to be a part of the issue of using this timber. [00:22:57] Presently, there are about 7.5 billion people in the world, and in 2050, there will be about 7 million living in cities proper. [00:23:10] So what's really critical, I'm going to see whether I can actually get this thing to work, because they gave me this little cigar, let's see, oh, not working. [00:23:18] In any case, what I'm really talking about is the negative, the yellow zone, and that's where these timber towers can really have an application, because they can drive down the CO2, quite importantly. [00:23:30] So we have basically two tracks, and this is information that's gleaned from the World Economic Forum and others. [00:23:39] Track one is do nothing, and that would lead us on to a significant increase in our CO2 footprint over time, and then the other one is to do something, and try to create a more sustainable world. [00:23:52] So again, in terms of housing and residential, we need double the capacity to what we have presently, and why engineered timber? [00:24:01] Well, one of the things is that it uses less waste compared to other materials. [00:24:06] Now, if we look at Toronto, we can see that concrete here is used primarily as the material of choice for whatever reason. [00:24:15] When we compare that to a place like New York, as an example, it's double the percentage, and here as well, residential is more than 50% of the total use. [00:24:27] So we have residential, and we have high use of concrete, well, how could we make a change to that, and why are other materials not also being investigated? [00:24:37] In terms of negative embodied carbon, steel, concrete, because they use a huge amount of energy to process them. [00:24:44] And all of these things, other than timber, are really extracted from the soil, and can't be renewed or reused so easily. [00:24:52] Steel, a little less difficult, but still using a lot of processing energy. [00:24:58] While this timber, oddly enough, is virtually zero, or negative, because it's sequestering the CO2. [00:25:06] In fact, the energy for producing a piece of wood from the forest to your table, 90% of the energy is actually in the drying process of the timber and seasoning it. [00:25:19] So if we could make some other methodology that would allow for the drawing of the timber, then you would be very far down the chain in terms of energy use. [00:25:29] Timbers, this type of material, is very, very strong by weight, and you can sort of see by graph, it's equal, comparable to steel, stronger by weight than concrete. [00:25:40] Concrete just happens to be quite heavy by comparison. [00:25:42] So it's light and strong, and in urban settings, what's been found is that we would need in Europe and in London, as an example, about five to ten deliveries in concrete versus one delivery by timber and pre-assembled panels. [00:26:00] So wood is a good thing for cities, people have a great response to it, Frank Lloyd Wright thought it was the best friend. [00:26:09] So now we go on to this project particularly, where we were working with Cambridge University to look at the potential use of the material, and what they constantly are saying really is that this is renewable material. [00:26:22] When they study timber, they're also looking at bamboo and other sustainable, growing living materials that then can be brought forward. [00:26:34] In Canada, of course, there's a lot of timber, and this is the case in Europe. [00:26:39] In Europe, in Sweden, about 20% of the GDP is driven by their forestry products, and what they found is that there's been very recently a significant, I won't call it a collapse, [00:26:52] but a reduction, but a reduction, so they're looking at the use of their managed forests, so they have material that's growing, so they have sort of a stockpile of material, and they have no place to use it. [00:27:04] Their building codes are sort of rudimentary, this is an engineered timber, so it's not wood, but the classification needs to be made that allows this material to be used more effectively and more broadly. [00:27:20] In Canada, what has happened very likely in a similar scenario is that pulp and paper mills and that sort of thing have run into financial difficulties, partly because people don't read newspapers quite as much, and everybody's got tablets, so these primary uses of the past are no longer markets for this material, and that's true in Europe. [00:27:42] And so this CLT offers the potential of allowing for a greater number of houses and residential to be built quickly, easily, economically, and gives a new impetus to an industry that's somewhat in decline. [00:27:57] So this is the quote from a recent magazine about the wonderful, spectacular timber tower. [00:28:04] We're invited by Cambridge University because we have experience in tower design. [00:28:08] We are doing about three towers in London to date, and this was our team, University of Cambridge, Smith and Mulwork, who have a 15 year experience with this type of material. [00:28:16] And we're part of a larger package of architects that Cambridge have brought together to look at this material for high rise development. [00:28:30] So the design of this first oak wood timber tower in London was really based on the notion of quadrants, and very similar to the Sears tower. [00:28:38] And again, it's the tallest building proposed in London, if it were to be built. [00:28:42] But Cambridge are also working with architects in Chicago and engineers elsewhere to design other types of buildings very similarly. [00:28:52] So you can look up these timber towers and see that this is something that's being progressed with aid of industry. [00:28:59] And the notion really is that test the materials, build mock-ups, and get a better understanding in terms of the strength and use. [00:29:08] One of the wonderful things about timber is that people really, really like the material, apparently, for children who have learning disabilities, [00:29:15] if they're placed in schools, school rooms with timber surrounds, if also they can look out to green space, [00:29:23] then they do better, they perform better in tests, they're a little bit more sociable. [00:29:28] Apparently, our relation to wood is very a powerful one. [00:29:32] When we look at a piece of timber or live in these types of environments, our heart rate goes down, [00:29:39] and it's thought that we become a little bit more sociable, and there are other sorts of benefits. [00:29:44] Apparently, in hospitals, when they have hospitals with timber walls, and timber floors, and timber sinks, [00:29:49] people, it promotes healing. [00:29:54] That's a case in point that was mentioned in a recent -- hello. [00:30:06] So what we're saying with this first timber tower is that it would take about 120 minutes, about two hours, to grow the material. [00:30:12] All the material from renewable forests in Europe. [00:30:15] So the material is there. [00:30:16] It's growing fast enough. [00:30:17] And what we really find, which is interesting -- I'll take the model -- is that the tower itself represents 10,000 lifetimes of sequestering of the type of CO2 that would be normally accumulated in the atmosphere. [00:30:40] So when you think of it, instead of creating CO2 through industry, through harvesting, you can reduce the CO2 footprint and actually go negative. [00:30:56] And so the material is interesting. [00:31:00] It's somewhat well-suited for residential construction as well because the spans are less. [00:31:02] But really, the interesting part is that it's not part of the same type of industry. [00:31:06] It would really require a new type of industry, a new retooling, new type of contractors. [00:31:12] And again, the notion is that the material is a natural material. [00:31:17] But when you take it and cross-laminate it, you get something with totally different properties. [00:31:24] It has better fire resistance, much greater strength, much more dependable in terms of calculation. [00:31:31] You have probably all flown on planes recently that have carbon fiber that's used in the wings. [00:31:38] And carbon fiber is a very thin filament, very strong in its length, but very weak in its width. [00:31:46] So what they do, they take those filaments and they weave them together. [00:31:51] They don't weave them. [00:31:52] They place them together and laminate them together in a cross-directional fashion. [00:31:58] And that improves their strength. [00:32:00] In a sense, the strength that goes with its length is brought to bear for the material. [00:32:07] So in a very similar way, this cross-laminated timber is a new technology that is gaining a lot of interest in Europe, [00:32:16] particularly for housing. [00:32:18] But for architects, what's wonderful is that we really need to develop, therefore, a new language of architecture [00:32:25] that responds to the strengths of the material and what is goodness for that material. [00:32:31] One of the things that's interesting, of course, is that you look at art [00:32:34] and realize that artists understand the material quite well when it's well studied. [00:32:39] This is a wonderful exhibition that just happened a few years ago in Toronto. [00:32:44] Wonderful artist. [00:32:46] So this is the notion, really, is that architects, let's try to use this material in a new way. [00:32:52] In Canada, there's enough material to house a billion people, according to Cambridge University. [00:32:58] And this is the state of the art as it is. [00:33:01] A wonderful project called TRETT in Bergen, which was a prototype for us and we've been speaking with them. [00:33:06] This is 15 stories and they're about to double that height using the similar technology, similar concept of a bridge structure [00:33:14] that's rising vertically instead of bridging horizontally and then component parts that are fed into the structure. [00:33:23] Our site was outside of the limits of high-rise design, which is based on the Dome of St. Paul's and London Planning Code. [00:33:33] And we're sitting within a courtyard of that towered development that was built after the war. [00:33:42] It was designed in the 1970s and only completed in the 1980s and it's precast and cast in place concrete within courtyards. [00:33:53] And so we chose, because it was public housing initially, we thought that we would try to improve this notion of public housing in the centre city [00:34:02] and see what it would mean in a congested site. [00:34:04] So we've also been speaking with Bouygues, who are a contractor, how to create the logistics for building the building. [00:34:10] And the notion is not simply to build a tall tower, but also to build on top of the pre-existing concrete low bar buildings. [00:34:20] And if you ever go to Paris, you'll see exactly this happening. [00:34:23] They are now building a top of pre-existing buildings and it has to do with the code in Europe. [00:34:30] When you have a building, a new building, and build the foundations, you can only count 50% of the loading, [00:34:38] because there hasn't been sufficient compaction occurred. [00:34:42] But after 10 years, you could recalculate for 100% of loading. [00:34:47] So in other words, in a very vague way, you could build again another building on top of the pre-existing building, [00:34:54] because of the soil conditions were allowing for greater loading, double the loading. [00:35:00] And this is what's happening in Europe, in London as well. [00:35:03] People are starting to realise they can build high if they can build light. [00:35:07] And so this is a perfect example of where you can create greater density in cities without significant impact to existing structures. [00:35:16] Or you can build new structures. [00:35:18] So the affinity of the site, and I'm mentioning this because I'm an architect, you may not be interested, [00:35:23] but associated very strongly with St. Paul's. [00:35:26] So the notion was that the four piers of St. Paul's are really used as a prototype for the four piers that support the spire of the timber tower. [00:35:36] And the plan form has got four outer piers and a central rising spire through the height, and I'll go through this really quickly. [00:35:45] These are studies of the loading, and in terms of dead loading, we're working with something at the base that's about two and a half metres by two and a half metres in cross laminated timber, and laminated timber as well. [00:35:59] And it's going to be made of four quadrants, and I'll show you a video in a second. [00:36:03] But Cambridge is still testing members of comparable size to be able to understand what the loading factors would be and how resilient the members are to sizes. [00:36:12] Members that size aren't impossible, and there are bridge constructions that have been done of that size. [00:36:20] So in Europe, at least, it's something that's possible. [00:36:23] Here's the testing that's ongoing, just to show that there's a reality to this. [00:36:27] And these are very recently, only about a month ago, these are large members that are testing to the limit of what's possible for the testing gear. [00:36:35] They resized the members so that they could understand them, and that's 650 tonnes of a load being borne on that member. [00:36:43] So I'll just go through this quickly. There's a video right at the end. Here are the images. [00:36:48] *music* [00:37:16] guitar solo [00:37:46] guitar solo [00:38:16] Okay, can't beat Scovia. [00:38:31] Okay, so then the next is at Oakwood Timber Tower 2. [00:38:34] I'll go through this very quickly. [00:38:36] The notion really, we got a call from one of the clients [00:38:39] because this was published in the newspaper Wednesday. [00:38:41] We had met the mayor of London, now Boris, who was Boris Johnson. [00:38:45] He was born in the States and he remembered playing Lincoln Logs with his sister. [00:38:50] His sister kept knocking the logs off and he kept building and building. [00:38:54] So he really got the notion that these were pre-assembled elements [00:38:58] that could be stacked and manipulated to different form [00:39:01] and the notion also that the material was coming from nature. [00:39:05] And so he was quite impressed by the whole notion and then we got reported [00:39:09] and the news went to a front page of a Dutch magazine [00:39:14] and one of our clients phoned us up and said, we want one of these. [00:39:17] So he gave us a site that was the fifth site of a large development in the Netherlands. [00:39:23] Very narrow site, so it was a real problem [00:39:25] because for architects in urban settings, you very rarely get the ideal site. [00:39:29] This was perfectly square, so that was made it easy. [00:39:32] This was only, was going to be much more complex. [00:39:36] So the notion really is that it's a tree, it's got a central core [00:39:39] and what I was intending to do is to use straight members of timber [00:39:44] that therefore the loading could be made much more appropriate [00:39:47] and of course they're not quite so straight as they go around the corner [00:39:52] because the site's quite small. [00:39:54] But in any case, we've got a basket weave as an ocean which worked quite well [00:39:58] and these are quite the beautiful images that we've got out of it [00:40:01] and I've got the models here as well and there's a video. [00:40:04] What's interesting about that externally braced system [00:40:07] is it also provides shade if it's oriented properly. [00:40:10] So we have an external form that's providing the bracing [00:40:13] but also the shading for the inner lights of the tower. [00:40:19] So on your left is an image of our project [00:40:23] and then our right is just a flavor of images from Trett, Bergen [00:40:28] and other projects as well. [00:40:30] This is an upper sky garden bar, sky bar, [00:40:36] that the client was very adamant to have [00:40:38] because he wanted to integrate this notion of the building into the city. [00:40:45] I think that was a video. [00:40:48] Can you push that? [00:40:49] Thank you. [00:41:19] Thank you. [00:41:49] Thank you. [00:42:19] So again, the advantage is that the material is very light. It's made of components. It can be brought to site quite quickly. It would probably take about a quarter of the time as it would to building in other methods, potentially. [00:42:33] One of the things that also happened, as we were discussing with Weig, this version of Oakwood Timber Tower, was that they mentioned that we could really do this through robotics, that we could create a staged plant within the building. [00:42:47] You could see that the exterior actually is a bracing that works as a scaffold, and that scaffolding could be used to ratchet up a three-story factory. [00:42:58] So very raw material could be brought to site and create the panels that are required and under very specialized conditions. [00:43:08] So that's quite an interesting notion. In fact, the building would build itself with this very light material. [00:43:15] So when we discussed with the Swedish government, we proposed that they engage a university in Gothenburg, which is Chalmers University, create a PhD program where just this type of innovation in trying to intermesh digital technology, cutting and production, and the study of glues and other factors with this notion of how to promote the use of this product. [00:43:42] And it's called Digital Wood, and there are PhD students that are meant to be engaged, if we could only find funding from the Swedish government at the moment, but we're definitely going to go back to them and say, "This was your idea. Please help to promote this new material." [00:43:57] And I hope in Canada the same will happen, because the industry here, as far as I understand, is a little bit more abundant, and you do have a demand for housing, and it will increase because the size of Toronto, of course, is ever-increasing. [00:44:11] One of the wonderful things about the project is media. I'm just about to finish, and we've been, you know, gained accolades. This was a wonderful award to win, and it was an award not just for timber towers, not for steel or concrete, it was for the design of any tower in the world. [00:44:28] So to get that kind of recognition globally was quite wonderful. We also received, the group of us, including Cambridge University and Smith and Wal-Work, the President's Award for Research. We weren't just shortlisted, we actually won. So I'm going to have to talk to the guy who made that slide, which was me. [00:44:46] So that's it. If there are any questions, I've got models up here. The most wonderful thing to do with this type of material is to come up and actually touch the thing, so you can understand the weight and the sensibility of it. It's quite different type of material than steel and concrete. Thank you. [00:45:04] I've just been told that I was on time, which is impossible. This is awesome. This is an MC's dream is to have your speaker finish a couple of minutes early. [00:45:22] So based on that, we have about five minutes for questions, and you have the opportunity here to meet a great Canadian talent who's changing things around the world. [00:45:35] So do we have any questions for Kevin? Lots of pictures. So we have one right over here. [00:45:44] Hi. So I'm a student at University of Toronto. My name is Wen. [00:45:48] And thanks for the very inspiring talk about the innovations that are leading us to the future. [00:45:54] I have a question for you that kind of came in three parts. [00:45:59] And so I'm wondering how you see the buildings are going into the future, say 10 years from now. [00:46:06] Is it a leading trend that we're going to be less reliant on the grid? [00:46:11] And what technologies would enable us to get there? And the last part of the question. [00:46:17] Is there any interesting ideas around that? What do we do with the existing old buildings that are the remaining 90% of the building stock? [00:46:28] Okay. So when you're mentioning the grid, are you referring to urban grid or you're referring to electrical grid? [00:46:33] Yeah, like electrical grid or the supporting infrastructure. [00:46:36] Perfect. Okay. So the fellow at OVG did a wonderful, wonderful YouTube. [00:46:42] And he described how he was influenced by Donald Trump to begin, but then Al Gore. [00:46:51] Because Al Gore came to me and said, "Well, what type of industry are you in?" [00:46:54] "Well, I'm in development." And he said, "And I don't think I can be very helpful." [00:46:58] He said, "No, that's not true. 40% of the energy that's used is buildings, you know, and this is going to be the wave of the future." [00:47:04] And I really do think that's correct. What the fellow at OVG is talking about is building many buildings in a collection. [00:47:13] But the edge apparently produces more energy than it uses. So it's a factory. It is something that is actually collecting solar and it's got such a wonderful envelope. [00:47:24] And the large atrium is actually a large tromb. It's basically collecting energy and balancing the amount of energy gaining and lost through the day. [00:47:34] That we're living in a time where this type of technology isn't new. It's not the future. It's now. [00:47:42] So what he is doing is saying, "Well, let's build a few of them. Let's connect them." [00:47:47] Now, there's researchers, a fellow that I know, that I've recently met in Kingston University, and what he's looking at is storage. [00:47:56] If the storage of electricity can be transformed to something other, and also, I think, transmission, because so much energy is lost in transmission, [00:48:08] the world will change very fundamentally. And you have to understand, think of, "Oh, God. I've lived a long time. [00:48:16] So a lot of the companies that I would have known, you've never heard of." [00:48:20] Because every 20, 10, 20 years, it happens in our industry. Every seven years, there's a total changing of the guard. [00:48:29] The industry leaders are those who take up technologies like this today and are aware that they exist. [00:48:35] And as professionals, really, you have some obligation to know what is going on in the world around you. [00:48:42] And this is why it's wonderful for me to speak. I know something of it, of one sector of it. [00:48:47] What was your second question? [00:48:52] What do we do with the old buildings? [00:48:55] What do you want to do with them? [00:48:57] Well, you're building all those really wonderful new buildings that are innovative. [00:49:01] But all the old buildings that make up the most of the building stock and they consume the most energy, [00:49:07] what do we do with them? [00:49:10] What do you think we should do with them? [00:49:13] There are some building designs that were really of their time. [00:49:16] I was thinking of building, have you ever driven a car from the 1950s? [00:49:20] Well, the problem with them is that there's no seat belts and they had a driving column at the steering wheel [00:49:26] that if there was a sudden impact, the steering column would kill you. [00:49:33] So, look at these older buildings and make an assessment as to whether they're really appropriate for the time, [00:49:40] whether they're going to be useful for the present and to the future. [00:49:45] Buildings change all the time. [00:49:47] If you look at a photograph that's 50 years old, you'll be very, very surprised, [00:49:51] as you would be if you were in London, because the building stock changes over almost 100% within about 50 to 70 years. [00:49:59] There are very, very few remnants of old London in central London. [00:50:04] Cities are changing organisms. [00:50:07] You don't see it because the change happens somewhat slowly, but they are. [00:50:12] The change and renewal is something that is really an adjunct of a healthy economic cycle for the city. [00:50:22] If you have a city that's simply an aspic that remains with all of its wonderful buildings, [00:50:27] they're no longer living cities in that sense. [00:50:30] So, I think looking at buildings in a different way, seeing their efficacy, [00:50:34] and trying to understand that they're needing to promote a larger goal, [00:50:38] which is to the benefit of the people of the city. [00:50:43] You here are designers and people involved in design. [00:50:47] You need to understand the cities are there to be used. [00:50:52] They're there to provide shelter, but also to give people a sense of aspiration to move forward. [00:50:58] They need to make them feel safe and provide social spaces that promote the exchange of ideas between people. [00:51:06] If they don't do that, then I think they should be considered not to exist in the city proper, [00:51:13] unless they can be re-inhabited in a different way. [00:51:16] Some of the greatest buildings in London are old factories and energy centres that have been converted into museums. [00:51:23] But you really need to make a different, understand cities not as a series of objects, [00:51:29] but as places where people coalesce together, share ideas. [00:51:33] And cities depend. You're competing with other cities. [00:51:37] Your lifeblood is the people in them and the ability of the buildings and the architecture and the urban spaces to allow for that sharing. [00:51:45] Any other? That's a lovely polemic, isn't it? [00:51:51] Can I just get the other side of the room first? We'll go back and forth, back and forth. [00:51:55] Is this illustrating a political bent here? [00:51:57] It is. [00:51:58] Left and right or that doesn't happen in Canada? [00:52:00] We have about ten minutes, so take your time. [00:52:02] Thank you for the presentation. [00:52:05] Is the elevator system or any of the other mechanical and electrical systems impacted design-wise by the wooden structure? [00:52:14] No. Well, I'll just repeat what I heard from Michael Romage from Cambridge University. [00:52:20] Is that the lift people actually prefer not to have concrete. [00:52:24] They prefer the timber because it's somewhat more pliant, which I don't quite understand, but apparently that's so. [00:52:33] Sorry, it's somewhat more pliant. [00:52:36] That if you pour something in concrete and it's wrong, it's wrong forever. [00:52:41] That was one of the things that he mentioned, but more so that they're happy to have the cores if they're made of timber, properly all made of timber. [00:52:49] And they're somewhat stable, they can be made more accurately in the first instance. [00:52:54] The accuracy of these timber panels is phenomenal. [00:52:57] In Tourette, the steel had to be recut because the assembly of the panels were so accurate. [00:53:04] So you have to understand that this is not like, you know, this isn't stuff you get a Canadian tire. [00:53:09] This stuff is this really high precision material and it has to be because it needs to be stacked extraordinarily accurately. [00:53:18] Any carpenters here? [00:53:19] I used to be a carpenter. [00:53:21] And you get it wrong by just a few millimeters and stack it over ten stories, you're off by lot. [00:53:27] So the precision is important. [00:53:29] One of the other things we didn't mention was fire, but I'll mention that subsequently after all these questions. [00:53:36] Come up and see the models too. [00:53:38] You know, sitting is bad for your health. [00:53:40] And texting is even worse. [00:53:41] Okay. [00:53:42] Hi. [00:53:43] I want to follow up on the comment that you made at the tail end of the last question, or the previous question, which was about these tall buildings that you're doing and the public realm. [00:54:01] You, in one of your slides, you talked about London and the genius of London's cafes and the cafe society. [00:54:09] And that illustration showed what I interpreted to be public realm up in the, up in the tower. [00:54:18] This city is completely fixated with building residential density in the downtown core. [00:54:27] And one of the things that seems horribly unthought about, not calculated in any way, shape or form, is the notion of amenity, mixed use, et cetera. [00:54:48] So what is your strategy, if there is one there, about taking people off the street through a private realm to some kind of public realm up in the sky? [00:55:01] Okay. [00:55:02] So the first thing that should be understood is that we're involved with a company called The Collective. [00:55:06] And they're building micro housing, basically, for urban individuals in city centres. [00:55:12] In London, they have one that's just got planning, we're involved with that, and then one a little further out. [00:55:18] And the notion there is that there are young professionals who have just come out of university, who have lots of ideas and talent, [00:55:24] and really like spaces as they would have them in their university settings, in dorms where you have lots of sharing going on. [00:55:32] So in these places, there's the potential of sharing kitchen spaces, of having a shared central space that's very public and sort of semi-public, let's say. [00:55:43] Of course, they'd be carded for security, but the security is really trying to invite people into the building as guests. [00:55:53] So they're sort of guest halls. [00:55:54] I think in Toronto, there still are, usually on the ground floor here, there are large public spaces where people can come down their elevators and meet guests and friends and go have a little dinner. [00:56:07] And it used to be the case. [00:56:08] Maybe it's not anymore. [00:56:09] Certainly in Montreal, it was very common because of the sociability of the spaces. [00:56:14] You're talking about the upper gardens as well. [00:56:16] Well, those are part of this notion that we create this shared public spaces. [00:56:20] What we're finding in the UK is that the marketplace really is women, young women who want to feel secure in the setting, [00:56:28] who also want to be associated with this sort of green, new emerging green technology, and also young professional males. [00:56:36] And what we're hoping is that these buildings will become sort of hives of new ideas, [00:56:41] that all these professionals will cross-breed their ideas so that we get some kind of a new emerging technologies that rise from it, [00:56:55] new ideas of how to live and sharing of, you know, the advantage of their knowledge. [00:57:01] And that does happen in cities in London. [00:57:03] People really do go and have a coffee or a beer and they talk about what they do as a speciality. [00:57:10] And then they try to understand what the other people are doing as their speciality. [00:57:14] And then they think, well, is there any connection we can make a business out of this? [00:57:17] Because I can sort of see there's a crossover. [00:57:19] There's a synergy that's potential. [00:57:21] And that was the notion of that building. [00:57:23] For Brexit, we need new ideas. [00:57:26] The world is a land of new ideas, not of objects and things any longer. [00:57:31] So that was really the impetus of the tower, bring new people in who are, you know, enervated by new technology. [00:57:38] I hope that answers. [00:57:40] It may not answer. [00:57:41] But I do agree with Ian Toronto. [00:57:43] Planning is a concern that you should be having. [00:57:47] And I think making more public spaces available would be terrific. [00:57:53] Particularly on the waterfront. [00:57:55] Yeah. [00:57:56] We have time for two more questions. [00:57:58] So if we want to just kind of- [00:58:00] I was too early. [00:58:01] One more. [00:58:02] All right. [00:58:03] Which one goes? [00:58:04] Ladies first. [00:58:05] Ladies first. [00:58:06] Ladies first. [00:58:07] Hi. [00:58:08] Thank you for the great talk. [00:58:09] And I like the idea of using timber as a building innovation. [00:58:13] But what are some challenges that you see for us to promote using timber instead of concrete or steel? [00:58:20] Well, the first thing is I think it was mentioned earlier that the industry has to grow of its own. [00:58:28] Because the type of engineers, the engineering that's taught in schools, neglects timber. [00:58:34] This type of timber, it's not taught. [00:58:36] And also there are very few contractors, very likely, that are knowledgeable in this type of material. [00:58:41] In Nova Scotia they're building quite a lot of them, I've heard. [00:58:44] And there they can build them at ten. [00:58:46] There are six to eight stories. [00:58:48] The code allows them to do this. [00:58:50] The code in Ontario has been changed very recently to allow this type of construction at lower heights. [00:58:56] But the industry has to, there has to be a new industry growing. [00:59:00] Think of Tesla. [00:59:01] It doesn't use gas. [00:59:03] It's using the roads. [00:59:05] But it's a new invention. [00:59:07] And it's something that is going to have to be transformative but also builds from knowledge, new knowledge that's created. [00:59:15] And this is why universities, associating ourselves with the university is critical. [00:59:19] Because we're just at this nascent stage where new information needs to be provided to move us forward. [00:59:26] For the taller tower in Holland, what we need to do in order to reinforce, we understand, we need to actually put cables potentially through the timbers on the lower levels. [00:59:37] Because there's a tension and compression calculation that seems to require extra stiffness. [00:59:44] And that's something that's been done in New Zealand and Australia. [00:59:48] Common place there. [00:59:49] And lovely that we have the inter-world wide web. [00:59:52] Because we can communicate with these people and share information directly. [00:59:56] It's like a little club now. [00:59:58] There are about 150 people. [00:59:59] Mr. Michael Green was one of the, you know, fantastic promoters of this type of technology as well. [01:00:05] But it's a small group now who are trying to promote it. [01:00:12] And our intention is trying to get younger people interested in it so that it becomes a new type of technology, a new industry of its own. [01:00:19] Oh, okay. [01:00:20] We're not going to be able to change people who only build out of concrete to people who only build out of timber or want to. [01:00:26] Okay. [01:00:27] One more question. [01:00:28] That's not how it works. [01:00:29] Yeah. [01:00:30] Okay. [01:00:31] There. [01:00:32] And I'll come back to you. [01:00:33] Okay. [01:00:34] So I'm a conflicted generalist. [01:00:36] So this presentation overarching of cars and towers and cities and energy is just firing synapses all over the place. [01:00:42] Great. [01:00:43] So it's wonderful. [01:00:44] Does everyone else feel that way? [01:00:45] Hands up. [01:00:46] When I'm not a conflicted generalist, I'm a facade specialist with WSP. [01:00:50] Great. [01:00:51] And I want to pick up on one. [01:00:52] Yeah. [01:00:53] I want to pick up on one point. [01:00:54] You mentioned the exterior exoskeleton essentially of this building providing some shade. [01:01:00] But generally, again very generally, facades tend to obscure the structure or at least protect [01:01:05] it from the elements. [01:01:08] How have you managed that interaction of structure and interior space and weathering and facade integration [01:01:16] and thermal bridging? [01:01:17] I mean, what is a terrific component? [01:01:18] Great. [01:01:19] Great. [01:01:20] Okay. [01:01:21] So thermal performance, timber's quite good. [01:01:23] Yeah. [01:01:24] First, there is a problem of wanting to express the timber externally. [01:01:28] We have been talking with AXO Nobel about what we can do. [01:01:32] It's likely that we're going to have to put some kind of a forward panel that's timberish [01:01:37] that sits, that allows to insulate the panel. [01:01:40] The timber changes. [01:01:41] This material changes with water ingress. [01:01:44] Yeah. [01:01:45] So we can't sort of have the rain hitting one side of the building and it's swelling. [01:01:49] Exactly. [01:01:50] So there are these kinds of challenges that are ongoing. [01:01:53] But the benefits, but also I think the sort of proven technology to date, they're no sort [01:02:00] of what they call in the UK showstoppers. [01:02:02] There's nothing that seems to be a challenge that's impossible to meet. [01:02:06] Every material has its downside. [01:02:08] Every material has its negative. [01:02:11] So we kind of see there's generally very great positives with this material. [01:02:16] It can create a new industry and it can broaden the use of different materials. [01:02:21] In Toronto, quite astonishingly, 80%, 81% of the material here is used concrete, which [01:02:26] is, you know, they don't even do that in New York. [01:02:29] So, you know, you have a marketplace that has the advantage of accepting something new and [01:02:36] different that can challenge and be provocative. [01:02:41] One of the other things that should be mentioned is that they're also looking at glass because [01:02:45] celluloid in China and Russia, the film stock that was used for films, you probably don't [01:02:50] even know what film is, most of you guys, but it was made from cellulose. [01:02:54] They used to cut the tree down and the byproduct was celluloid. [01:02:57] And now, of course, there are researchers trying to encapsulate timber, but also to use that [01:03:04] formulation to create glass. [01:03:06] So, you know, you can imagine 20 or 30 years, the whole building will be made of timber. [01:03:10] Not just the external exoskeleton, but the glass itself. [01:03:14] And those could lead to how to protect the timber as well, potentially. [01:03:19] We're very early, early stage of this development. [01:03:23] But if you have any interest, just come by, give me your card if you have interest or have [01:03:28] any other connections. [01:03:29] And I see somebody here from RWDI right there. [01:03:32] Hi. [01:03:36] Okay. [01:03:37] What was your question? [01:03:38] You're going to have to do it quickly, though. [01:03:39] Okay, okay. [01:03:40] Thanks for the answer. [01:03:41] What are some challenges that concrete or steel, like other materials, have over timber? [01:03:45] And is it possible for combining use of timber, concrete, and steel in one building? [01:03:51] Okay, I'll do that really quickly. [01:03:52] I went to a talk at the AIA convention about a year ago. [01:03:55] The people in the concrete industry want to reduce the amount of energy that they're using. [01:04:00] Uh-huh. [01:04:01] So they've made great strides in doing that. [01:04:03] Okay. [01:04:04] They don't necessarily talk about CO2, but they have an interest because as oil prices [01:04:08] go up, they don't want to use, you know, it digs into their profits. [01:04:12] But fundamentally, a lot of these technologies are 3,000 years old. [01:04:17] Concrete was invented by the Greeks, somewhat perfected by the Romans. [01:04:21] In India, they created iron. [01:04:24] The type of iron that we see now was created in India. [01:04:27] The Vikings created better forms of steel. [01:04:32] I think it was chromium steel, and then the Germans reinvented it in the 20th century. [01:04:37] So these are materials that are ancient, and they have their own building industry that's equally as ancient, [01:04:47] because the material itself tends to create a normative platform from which you need to understand how to build. [01:04:55] There are stages of building, and you do not need the concrete to cure. [01:04:59] You need to make formwork. [01:05:01] So the industry is 2,000 years old. [01:05:05] How different is it from the Romans? [01:05:08] So this material, using digital technology and its cutting and its performance and its laminating and assembly, [01:05:16] is a new way forward. [01:05:18] It will transform the way that we see a building buildings. [01:05:22] It will make them much more cost effective, no doubt, because it will be made on an assembly line pattern. [01:05:28] And it has the benefits of being CO2 less and sequestering all that wonderful CO2 that we are going to have a problem with as the population increases. [01:05:40] You have to, population growth apparently is not going to, is going to plateau after about 2050. [01:05:46] And the reason given is that women will be educated. [01:05:50] The education of women is part of the solution for population growth and globally, I've understood. [01:05:56] So, you know, we have to look to the future and what's to the benefit of people at large and to the cities. [01:06:06] How do we want to live in our lovely cities? [01:06:08] I've got to cut it off here, sorry. [01:06:12] Okay, you can ask me later. [01:06:14] Absolutely. [01:06:15] Thank you very much for inviting me. [01:06:17] All right. [01:06:26] Thank you.