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Timber catches OFFSITE imagination
Summer 2007
Published: 18 June, 2007
Timber played a major role at BRE’s OFFSITE 2007 exhibition and conference in June, with five of the six state-of-the-art sustainable houses in The Big Build showcase using wood-based construction methods OFFSITE2005 saw steel and concrete take centre stage, but this year timber-building specialists dominated. Kingspan Off-Site’s Lighthouse, based on a glulam portal frame and the company’s TEK stuctural insulated panels, was billed as the first home to meet the top level 6 of the government’s Code for Sustainable Homes (CSH). This means zero net CO2 emissions from energy used in the house. The CSH level 5 Sigma SIPs semi-detached homes from Stewart Milne Timber Systems included a thermal stack, with vents opened automatically for optimum air quality and temperature, and the company said it planned to build a whole Sigma village with houses using communal heat and power generation to achieve CSH level 6. The Osborne House, built in 36 hours using Vencel Resil SIPs, exceeded the carbon emission requirements in Part L of the building regulations by 40%, while ecoTECH’s low-energy, closed panel, pod-based Swedish home used whole-house automation technology from CISCO Systems. The Big Build also featured a mini school developed by Wilmott Dixon’s Re-thinking consultancy, White Design and timber construction specialist Eurban using cross-laminated solid prefabricated timber panels from Finnforest Merk. Related articles: |
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