Green Washing – The Deceitful Marketing

If you think greenwashing is limited to retail or fashion, think again. It’s rampant in the construction industry. So buying the right materials requires a lot of diligence, writes Victoria Brocklesby

Brand after brand within the retail and packaging spaces is being undone by ‘greenwashing’ claims. Just look at Coca Cola, Unilever, Tesco and H&M among others. Yet greenwashing isn’t just limited to these sectors; it’s rife within the construction industry too. It’s just no one was talking about it, until now.

For many, greenwashing is a deceitful marketing tactic intended to deliberately mislead customers. For others, it can happen even when there are good intentions, like when the messaging is not clear enough or if the company is not thorough enough in its sustainability policies across all aspects of its business.

Greenwashing in the construction industry is challenging to identify. Terms like “eco”, “green”, “sustainable”, “non-toxic” and “recyclable” are often used vaguely or with unclear language on websites, marketing materials, and social media posts. Superficial claims lacking substantiation are common. Trusting brands blindly is no longer an option, necessitating self-education on the sustainability aspects of products and services to prevent exploitation.

I have seen businesses manipulate product information to ensure they “meet” industry regulations. This includes exaggerations of the time and money spent on upgrading products to be more thermally efficient, when in fact, they have simply added an extra pane of glass to a window. While this does achieve the short-term aim, it’s a quick fix and has long term implications, such as making the product more expensive for the consumer, and less environmentally friendly due to more materials being used.

This continues into the recyclability of products. We have seen UPVC manufacturers, who solely use long-lasting plastic, speak about how they recycle, but in practice, recycling it is incredibly challenging. Materials made from something called uPVC – unplasticised polyvinyl chloride – do not decompose, making them difficult to eliminate, with 83 percent of UPVC waste going to landfill, according to the WWF.

This means identifying greenwashing requires diligence. Accreditations play a vital role in establishing trust, allowing people to assess a company’s commitment to ethics and sustainability. It can be useful to look for third-party recommendations from reputable organisations, rather than self-appointed accolades. Consumers should pay attention to product-focused industry accreditations, while industry professionals should seek certifications demonstrating commitments to quality and sustainability, such as ISO 9001 for quality or ISO 14001 for environmental standards.

Source: City AM

/0 Comments/by

Is modular housing still the solution to the housing squeeze?

Prince William and Kate, the Princess of Wales, visit a modular home in Cambridge.

When Kevin McCloud, presenter of hit property TV show Grand Designs, went to the typically English town of Tunbridge Wells last September, it looked like a potentially revolutionary moment in Britain’s housing industry. One that might reverberate in Australia.

McCloud was there to watch Rob and Kate Harris demolish a semi-rural 1940s bungalow and replace it with a prefabricated, modular two-storey home. Once the old place was demolished, the company Boutique Modern trucked in the new one, built entirely in its nearby factory.

The various modules came already kitted out with their kitchen and bathroom fittings, and Boutique Modern’s team slotted it all together in just a couple of days. The new owners were impressed with the result, as was a rhapsodic McCloud.

It seemed like modular housing’s long-heralded escape from its redoubts in Sweden and Japan was at last beginning.Modular housing has for some years been touted as the answer to the British construction industry’s labour shortages and net-zero challenges – and experts have advocated a similar solution for the housing supply squeeze in Australia.

Three years ago, estate agency Savills Research predicted modular construction’s share of British new-build housing would double to 20 per cent by 2030.

Prince William and Kate were even photographed visiting modular houses built in Cambridge to tackle an affordable housing shortage.

But early last month, the industry’s aura of evolutionary inevitability hit a setback. Legal & General, which had positioned itself as the industry’s front-runner by setting up a big factory in the northern English town of Selby in 2016, had to shut up shop.

Having invested a reported £182 million ($348 million) and hired almost 500 people, the business had racked up cumulative losses put at £176 million – leaving L&G little choice but to withdraw and lick its wounds.

Mark Farmer, CEO of Cast Consultancy and a committed advocate of modular housing, admits the closure was a blow.

“A story like that, it makes waves and it will have affected people’s perceptions. There’s a lot of naysayers out there. They’re all sitting there rubbing their hands, saying ‘told you so’,” he said.

“What’s happened to L&G is probably a good reflection of the struggles that anyone has – whether it’s Legal & General or an SME startup – trying to change an industry that just hasn’t been changed for decades, if not hundreds of years.”

Savills’ Richard Valentine-Selsey said his agency’s forecast for the take-up of modern methods of construction (MMC) was now looking a bit optimistic.

“We will get to that sort of level, but it’s just going to take us longer to get there than we thought two to three years ago, because the sector hasn’t taken off as quickly as we thought,” he said.

Australia watching

Some pioneers are still ploughing ahead, most prominently the modular housing company TopHat. It has backing from Goldman Sachs, is building a second factory, and in April signed a deal with top-three British house-builder Persimmon.

TopHat managing director Andrew Shepherd says his company wants to grow incrementally – a contrast to L&G’s apparent willingness to dive in head-first.

And he says TopHat’s model is already attracting curiosity Down Under, where the challenge of building enough affordable housing is just as pressing as it is in Britain.

“It’s a nascent industry here, and I’d say it’s even more a nascent industry over in Australia,” he said.

“But there’s definitely keen interest in what can be done over here in the UK and the replicability of that back home for you. We’ve seen huge interest from Australian contractors and Australian manufacturers over the last few months, asking ‘what have you learnt?’.”

Cast Consultancy’s Farmer has just returned from a trip to Sydney, where he was looking at a NSW government modular construction project involving school buildings.

“As in the UK, I saw part of the market really hungry for change. But I also saw a mirror image of the UK’s behavioural issues, the resistance, the vested interests not wanting things changed. And that nervousness, just the nervousness about change.”

Psychological barrier

It might seem surprising that an industry with an ageing, expensive and short-handed workforce – particularly in trades such as bricklaying – might resist innovations that could drive huge efficiency gains.

The hesitancy is especially strange because modular housing can more easily accommodate the new green building regulations – covering areas like insulation, for example – that are only a couple of years away.

But as TopHat’s Shepherd tells it, these structural dynamics are being trumped by simple psychology.

“The people that are making the decisions on how to do construction on construction sites, they’ve got 30 years of muscle memory in doing things traditionally,” he said.

One of his biggest jobs is to walk the industry – “the mortgage market, insurers, contractors, developers, planners and build-to-rent investors” – into the modular “journey”.

“It is not going to happen overnight. It is steps. We’ve worked with customers delivering almost proof-of-concept, delivering smaller schemes to get them more comfortable.”

Persimmon’s investment in Shepherd’s company is primarily aimed, at least initially, at securing supplies of some of TopHat’s modular components, particularly its 3D-printed brick cladding, rather than buying full-scale, or “volumetric”, modular homes.

Farmer said this now looked like the best way forward. “I think the learning from L&G is that to do the whole thing in one go is a big step initially, it is high risk. You need to know your manufacturing, you need to have that demand there,” he said.

“Whereas if you have a more distributed, diversified offer with different types of manufacturing – pods and panels mixed up, giving more versatility to your customers – then you’re likely to have a more certain demand market. I can see the house builders going down that route over the next decade.”

Supply side

But if there’s a case on the supply side, what about demand? The question is whether consumers are equally as conservative as developers when it comes to factory-built housing.

“In the UK, if you go back to postwar, there are some relatively negative connotations around prefab building,” said Valentine-Selsey.

“That has left a public perception, completely incorrect, that the current system is delivering something that is inferior in some ways to the traditional bricks and mortar that everyone knows and loves.”

Shepherd suggested that younger buyers were more interested in the price and environmental sustainability of a house than its construction method.

Still, even if TopHat tees up the demand side as well as the supply, it would be just a drop in the sparsely filled bucket that is the British housing industry.

TopHat’s new factory will supply 4000 houses a year. Demand in Britain is more like 300,000 houses a year. A modular revolution would need a lot more companies with a lot more factories.

“We’re not trying to deliver the 200,000 houses that are already built every year. Those are already happening. It’s the next 50,000 that really suit the modern methods of construction,” Shepherd said.

It remains to be seen how quickly the idea will catch on. The Harrises’ new house in Kent will not be to everyone’s taste. But for the industry, that hour of Grand Designs fame remains a moment to savour.

“Whenever you see programs like the one Kevin did a few months ago, on Grand Designs, that’s a massive opportunity to show the public what is possible,” Farmer said.

Source: Financial Review

/0 Comments/by
,

Offsite Speeds up £35m Hospital Construction

The long-awaited new £35m hospital for Berwick is being built one year quicker than traditional construction methods would take.

Work is well underway on the new hospital at manufacturing specialist Merit’s its offsite manufacturing factory in Cramlington.

Marion Dickson, Northumbria Healthcare NHS Trust’s executive director for nursing, midwifery and allied health professionals and project lead said:

“We’re very impressed with Merit’s offsite manufacturing capabilities which can fortunately bypass any bad weather and provide quicker solutions to the build of our new hospital.

“Our new hospital will not only provide high quality healthcare well into the future but will also provide a much-improved environment for our staff and patients, enable additional services to be provided and support staff recruitment and retention.

“It will be something that Berwick, Northumberland, and the North East, can be very proud of.”

The factory was recently visited by Berwick MP Anne-Marie Trevelyan and Blyth Valley MP Ian Levy.

They were able to view the start of the build of the 800+ pre-assembled modules (PAMs) and 17 UltraPODs® that will be delivered to site to form part of the state-of-the-art building.

The parliamentarians also received a demonstration of Merit’s factory robot, just one of the Industry 4.0 initiatives in progress along with computer numerical control (CNC) technology, automation and digitalisation.

Merit’s approach also offers a zero carbon emissions-design, class leading lower energy consumption, enhanced infection control and is technically enabled for the future of health care.

Ms Trevelyan said:

“It’s really exciting to see the work being done on Berwick’s new hospital and it’s amazing that this area of the country will be the first to benefit from this modern solution to healthcare.”

Tony Wells, CEO at Merit, added:

“We are delighted to be working closely with Northumbria Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust and Northumbria Healthcare Facilities Management (NHFM) to build the new Berwick hospital which will be completed by late 2024.

“It was great to welcome Rt Hon Anne-Marie Trevelyan MP and Ian Levy MP to our factory to show them the work being done on the region’s newest hospital and to explain how different manufacturing processes are being used to improve productivity.

“We believe that on a larger scale, this solution will bring affordability to the NHS with hospitals being built significantly faster with cost certainty.”

The hospital trust recently announced a number of upcoming changes to inpatient care as groundworks progress.

A new temporary ward for inpatients is being installed in the maternity car park to ensure that the new hospital opens on schedule towards the end of 2024.

The relocated 10-bed inpatient ward, which will have all the facilities and access that the existing one does, will admit inpatients from around mid-July.

Some patients that would usually be admitted to Berwick Infirmary will be cared for at Alnwick Infirmary and the trust will also care for as many patients as it can within the community.

Where a patient is cared for will depend on their clinical need and Northumbria Healthcare will provide transport for patients and relatives as appropriate.

Maternity, oncology, ambulatory care and minor injury unit services will remain within the Berwick Infirmary building and will not be affected. This will only affect patients being admitted to the infirmary.

 

Source: Northumberland Gazette

/0 Comments/by

Partnership to Develop Fusion Energy Plant

The UK Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA) has partnered with Dassault Systèmes’ 3DEXPERIENCE platform to develop a fusion energy plant.

Fusion energy harnesses the same processes that power the sun and stars.

The collaboration aims to demonstrate the production of safe, virtually limitless energy through UKAEA’s Spherical Tokamak for Energy Production (STEP) programme.

Using the 3DEXPERIENCE platform, the UKAEA plans to create a concept design of a spherical tokamak by 2024, paving the way for a prototype fusion energy plant capable of supplying electricity to the national grid.

The platform will provide a centralised source of information, enabling improved connection and management of the plant’s entire life cycle.

The platform is designed to help mitigate bottlenecks, risks and delays, ultimately enhancing confidence in project delivery.

Chris Waldon, Delivery Director of the STEP programme, highlighted the challenge of managing vast amounts of engineering design data and expressed enthusiasm for working with Dassault Systèmes to develop the virtual twin of the fusion plant’s design.

 

Source: Energy Live News

/0 Comments/by

Bill Gates Plans Mini Nuclear Plant in UK

Trawsfynydd Lake, Snwdonia

 

Companies including TerraPower, founded by the Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, and Rolls-Royce have declared an interest in building small modular reactors (SMRs) in North Wales, according to reports.

Development company Cwmni Egino – established by the Welsh government – recently completed the first phase of its viability study on the site of the decommissioned nuclear plant at Trawsfynydd.

It now says the location could viably host SMRs generating up to 1GW of electricity.

The UK government has said there will be a competitive tendering process for the development of SMRs, which it plans to roll out before the end of the decade.

If the Trawsfynydd project gets the green light, it could become the UK’s first SMR, with construction expected to start before 2030.

The plant could potentially generate 400 long-term jobs, as well as thousands more direct and indirect jobs during the construction phase.

A credible opportunity

Cwmni Egino believes it could also generate around €1.5 billion in gross value added for Wales, over the plant’s estimated 60-year lifespan.

Cwmni Egino CEO Alan Raymant said, “In addition to meeting our energy needs and net zero targets, deploying SMRs at Trawsfynydd offers a huge inward investment opportunity for Wales. This is aligned with key policies and priorities of both the UK and Welsh Governments.

“We believe that Trawsfynydd presents the first, most credible opportunity to kick start a long-term programme of SMR projects in the UK, and catalyse significant economic growth locally, regionally and nationally. Cwmni Egino provides a development vehicle to drive this forward.”

Raymant added, “Our plans are more advanced than other sites suited to small scale nuclear, and the work we’ve done over the past 12 months gives us added confidence that we can successfully deliver a project at Traws. We have already put in place a five year development programme which means our project can be ready for approval by the latter part of this decade – in line with the UK Government’s energy security ambitions.”

Source: Construction Europe

/0 Comments/by

Offsite Flood Defence Wall

A NEW flood defence wall is just one of the projects being worked on at the Salisbury River Park currently.

The wall will go behind the recreation ground allotments once completed and is being built offsite and cast in units at a factory due to limited space onsite.

The wet weather may have caused some delays but many aspects of the project go ahead as planned.

Environmental agency, project lead, Andy Wallis said: “Although wet weather has delayed some of the work in the river channel, the Salisbury River Park project remains on schedule.”

The focus has been on the construction work which is designed to reduce the risk of flooding to more than 350 homes and businesses. This will be completed by the end of the year.

A new bridge for vehicles in the Central Car Park is also being built, and work on flood walls at Summerlock Stream and Fisherton Recreational Ground is underway.

The riverside habitat work for wildlife which will go alongside high-quality public spaces is due to be completed next spring.

Andy said:

The wet weather has encouraged some Salisbury residents to take up residence in the river park ahead of schedule.

“Tadpoles were found in shallow pools of water onsite. A school of tadpoles have now been moved to a pond at Sarum St Paul’s Primary School and the remaining tadpoles to other safer locations.”

 

Source: Salisbury Journal

/0 Comments/by

Spacehub Sutherland Underway

An artist’s impression of an Orbex Prime launch from Sutherland Spaceport (Credit: Orbex) 

Vertical rocket launches could soon lift off from UK soil after construction started on the first mainland spaceport with that capability.

Scottish rocket firm Orbex announced the start of work on Sutherland Spaceport, formerly known as Space Hub Sutherland, today (5 May). Located on the north coast of Scotland, the facility will be the home spaceport of the rocket and launch services company, which will use the site to launch up to 12 orbital rockets per year.

Sutherland is intended to be the ‘first carbon neutral spaceport in the world’ in both construction and operation. The Orbex Prime rocket will reportedly run on renewable biofuel, while peat lifted during construction will be used to repair areas of peatland that have been degraded over centuries.

Engineering services company Jacobs, which has supported NASA on multiple space centre projects and spaceflight programmes, will build the site. It will also provide spaceport operations support, operations consultancy and engineering services, drawing on experience from complex nuclear and space-related sites.

Orbex revealed the final form of the Prime rocket in May 2022. The 19m, two-stage rocket is designed to transport small satellites weighing up to 180kg into low Earth orbit (LEO). The six rocket engines on the first stage will propel the vehicle through the atmosphere to an altitude of about 80km. The single engine on the second stage will complete the journey to LEO.

The Future Liquid Gas biofuel will be supplied by Calor UK.

“This fuel allows the rocket to reduce carbon emissions significantly compared to other similarly sized rockets being developed elsewhere around the world,” an Orbex announcement said. “Prime is also a reusable rocket, which has been engineered to leave zero debris on Earth and in orbit.”

The company has already signed launch contracts with seven customers. In preparation for the first launch, it is performing integration tests and testing launch procedures. It has hired dozens of staff at its headquarters in Forres to support the integration testing.

“Sutherland represents a new breed of spaceport, for a new breed of rocket. This is 21st century, agile spaceflight with sustainability at its core,” said Kristian von Bengtson, chief development officer and interim CEO at Orbex.

“With the construction of Sutherland Spaceport underway, this is an important piece of the puzzle that will make the UK a modern space nation. Just as importantly, we’re hopefully also setting the tone for how business can be a force for good, creating jobs and opportunities while minimising the impact upon the environment.”

The spaceport is expected to support about 250 new employment opportunities in the Highlands and Islands over the coming years, including 40 jobs in Sutherland and Caithness. Economic impact assessments commissioned by Highlands and Islands Enterprise (HIE) conclude that the presence of the spaceport could generate almost £1bn in gross value added (GVA) for the Highlands and Islands economy over the next 30 years.

The HIE and Scottish government have invested over £9m in the project. The UK Space Agency provided £2.55m in 2018, while today’s announcement also included details of £3m investment from the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority, following the decommissioning of the nearby Dounreay nuclear power station.

The ground-breaking ceremony to mark the start of construction was attended by officials and stakeholders including Richard Lochhead, minister for innovation for the Scottish government, Ian Annett, deputy CEO at the UK Space Agency, David Oxley, director of strategic projects at HIE, and Dorothy Pritchard, chair of Melness Crofters Estate, the home of the new facility.

“It is an incredibly exciting time for the space sector, with the first orbital launch from UK soil expected to take place in Scotland later this year,” said Lochhead. “Despite our relatively small country, Scotland plays a leading role in the space sector, and with the global market projected to grow to £490bn by 2030, we are well placed to become Europe’s leading space nation by 2030.

“The space sector already plays an integral part of our daily lives, allowing us to stay connected, predict weather and monitor the effects of climate change. Sutherland Spaceport and Orbex will play a vital role in providing benefits for our people, our economy and our planet.”

Annett said:

“This marks a major step forward for Sutherland Spaceport and demonstrates the UK’s growing launch capability and the thriving space sector in Scotland.

“The UK Space Agency has invested £8.5m in Scottish-based launch technologies through the European Space Agency’s Boost! programme, as well as £2.5m towards the spaceport and £5.5m for the development of Orbex’s Prime rocket, which has catalysed further investment from private and public partners.

“Not only will Sutherland Spaceport unlock 250 new job opportunities and boost the Highlands and Islands economy, but its carbon-neutral ambition underlines the UK’s position as a world-leader in sustainable space activities.”

Source: Institute of Mechanical Engineers

/0 Comments/by

GERMANY: EUROPE’S LARGEST 3D PRINTED BUILDING

Image SSV Architekten, “PERI”

EUROPE’S LARGEST 3D PRINTED BUILDING IS BEING CONSTRUCTED IN GERMANY

Europe’s largest 3D printed building is being constructed by PERI in the city of Heidelberg, Germany, with COBOD’s BOD2 printer.
The building is almost 600 m2 (6600 sft), 54m (162 ft) long, 11m (121 ft) wide and 9m (30 ft) high and contains an IT server hotel
The project is made for Heidelberg IT Management GmbH & Co. KG, a cloud & data center provider.

Europe’s largest 3D printed building is initiated by KRAUSGRUPPE, a project developer, builder, investor, real estate manager, and broker in the Heidelberg area. The city has always been at the forefront of innovation as it is a city of science. Now, that the Campbell Barracks have been renovated, the city will have a ground-breaking testament of 3D construction printing technology that will revolutionize the building sector. This ground-breaking project is being built for Heidelberg IT Management GmbH & Co. KG, a cloud and data center provider.

The building is approximately 54m long, 11m wide and 9m high. The construction process started 31st of March and is expected to be completed by the end of July 2023. It will serve as an IT server hotel, and is set to become one of the most technologically advanced and innovative buildings in the region.

Hans-Jörg Kraus, managing partner of the KRAUSGRUPPE, said:

 

“As an independent family business with a long tradition and a future ahead, we want to promote innovative construction methods in Heidelberg and make a positive contribution to sustainable building methods”.

PERI 3D Construction, a pioneer in 3D construction printing industry, is providing the know-how for the 3D printing process, and is using COBOD’s BOD2 3D construction printer to print the walls of the building. PERI is taking advantage of the high printing speeds of the printer, and plans to complete the printing of the walls of this large-scale project in just 140 hours, equivalent to printing 4 square meter of building per hour.

 

 

The architects from SSV Architekten and Mense Korte, who collaborated on the project, devoted a lot of attention to the design of the walls, which is very unique as seen in the renderings of the server hotel. Dr. Fabian Meyer-Brötz, Managing Director of PERI 3D Construction GmbH, commented:

“Based on parametric design, the special wall design used in the building documents the immense design freedom, that the COBOD BOD2 3D printer enables. We are very proud to be able to realize our largest building to date with this project”

Henrik Lund-Nielsen, Founder & General Manager of COBOD added:

“In this unique project PERI is emphasizing two of the key benefits of 3D construction printing; speed of execution and design freedom. Because of this our technology is capable of carrying out everything from materials savings windmill towers over low cost residential housing in Africa to architectural office type buildings in Germany.”

 

/0 Comments/by

IRELAND: Construction firms must use off-site modular building methods

Construction firms will be required to use off-site manufacturing for new public homes to speed up delivery.

The new state contractual requirements will represent a move away from the tradition of building homes block by block. Modular construction panels, light steel frames or timber frames will be used instead.

Government officials are hoping that the mandatory use of these modern methods of construction in public housing contracts will also drive down the high level of site waste from leftover blocks, planks and other materials.

Each off-site house part is manufactured to precise specifications in advance, which can reduce construction waste by 50 per cent.

The latest update on the government’s Housing for All plan states that the target for using modern methods of construction in public housing projects is “on track” for delivery by this summer.

Builders will be shown how to use modern methods of construction at a new “demonstration park” set up at the Mount Lucas construction training centre in Daingean in Offaly by the end of this year. It will have several different residential units including terraced housing, semi-detached houses and apartments.

The move is based on advice from the government’s official construction sector working group that public projects can be used to drive the adoption of modern methods of construction.

The Construction Industry Federation, which is led by Tom Parlon and is a member of the group, has welcomed the plan to get more firms to engage in modern methods of construction using public works.

A spokeswoman said it was sure that many firms would engage in the process.

“The construction industry is committed to supporting methods of construction that can deliver high-quality houses at the scale required to meet demand and build homes,” she said.

The government has given councils €94 million in funding to build 1,500 public homes on their own land using modern methods of construction, in a further attempt to drive the uptake.

Feargal Ó Coigligh, an assistant secretary in the Department of Housing, recently told the Oireachtas housing committee that modern methods of construction be “more timely and quicker” rather than “lower cost or lower quality”.

He also said that adopting these techniques would encourage manufacturers to build more off-site facilities in Ireland.

“You then get people working in much more agreeable environments when building our houses, and people happy to go into careers in the area,” he said.

Source: Business Post

/0 Comments/by

NEW ZEALAND: 6 WEEK MODULAR HOMES

In a matter of months, a six-storey apartment block has sprung up in Auckland’s Northcote thanks to a new modular system being piloted by housing agency Kāinga Ora.

The apartments are each made of between two and three pods that are carefully craned into place. It’s precision work, with a man wearing hefty safety gloves helping to guide and click them into place.

The pods or modules are manufactured in Vietnam by TLC Modular and then shipped to Northport in Whangārei before being trucked to the North Shore.

TLC Modular general manager Jeremy Wagon said the company aimed to crane into place between eight and 12 modules each day, and it took two to three modules to make an apartment.

He explained that TLC used a 530-tonne crane and a bespoke module lift consisting of a frame that has cables and clips attached to modules, which weight between 10–22 tonnes.

“It’s like Lego,” he said.

To join the modules up, the gap between them is filled with sealant. The interconnecting plug-and-play wires are hidden in the ceiling.

Wagon estimated it would take about six weeks to install the first 79 apartments, a month to do the remaining fit-out, and another four to six months to finish site works.

He said time savings were found in modular construction because different phases could be worked on concurrently.

“While someone is working on the concrete slab foundations, someone else is working on modules at the same time.”

The first apartments will be finished by October and the rest by January next year. They’ve been marketed for between $550,000 and $935,000 and range in size from 70.8 m² to 127.8 m².

“We use a modular method of construction, but we’re saying that if you walk into the finished product, it won’t look like a lego brick project,” Wagon said.

The apartments contain some futuristic features. The skirting boards, which look like any other white wooden trimming, are ambient heaters that warm up the room.

The development on the corner of Lake Road and Fraser Avenue stretches across two sites, and consists of 183 apartments made up of 525 modules.

Each home comes with its own app. The power points connect to wi-fi and can be remotely switched on and off.

The classic hot water cylinder is gone, in favour of an “instant” system with a heated element that the water runs through.

New homeowners won’t be picking up the keys. The doors have number pads and coded locks, although there will be swipe fobs.

Wagon said the theoretical limit of how high modular buildings could go was down to the strength of the earth it was built on, and regulations.

In Australia construction had stretched 16 floors high, and in New Zealand TLC was already looking into building a 13-floor hotel in Māngere for Holiday Inn.

Kāinga Ora’s development director Rohan Bush​ said the housing agency had been using “off-site manufacturing” for several years, but the new building was a pilot project for “volumetric” modules.

“We’re facilitating the arrival of this new technology. Having TLC working here with local designers and builders is building up the local expertise,” she said.

While the apartments in this development are either for KiwiBuild or the private market, Bush said Kāinga Ora had a target of building 500 to 600 public houses using off-site manufacturing.

“We need to get people into houses faster. If it shaves off months then it’s a huge win.”

Source: Stuff

/0 Comments/by