PhD SIIRI 3 - Évaluation de durabilité du cycle de vie des constructions en hauteur en bois

Problematic

The trend shows that, in the future, hybrid multi-storey building will be massively constructed due to the increasing demand. Building sector, itself, is also a major contributor to the excessive extraction of global natural resources and the emission of greenhouse gases (UNEP, 2007).

It is unquestionable that to assess sustainability performance of product/service we need an integrated assessment which not only covers three sustainability cores but also embody the life-cycle thinking in our way of evaluation. So, the approach will result in a remarkable product/service development that responsibly benefits economically, environmentally and ethically.

Objectives of the Research

The main objective of the project is thus to develop life cycle sustainability assessment (LCSA) methodology and to apply the obtained tool for the hybrid (wood-concrete) multi-storey building.

To do so, the new LCSA methodology will integrate three assessment tools that represent three pillars of sustainability, Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) for assessing the environmental impacts, Life-cycle Costing (LCC) for the economic and Social Life Cycle Assessment (SLCA) for the social aspect.

The second main goal is to extend the development of the LCSA methodology so that it is useful not only for comparison purposes but also for assessment of indirect impacts (consequences) due to the deployment of hybrid multi-storey building that is seen going to be rising in the coming decade.

Methodology

The main methodology that will be used in this project is LCSA, a framework consisting of LCA+LCC+SLCA. By using this framework, the expected results that will be achieved are:

• Comprehensive sustainability assessment results with life-cycle thinking approach from cradle to grave in hybrid (wood-concrete) multi-storey building.
  • Environmental impact results (global warming potential, energy consumption, human toxicity, ozone depletion, etc.)
  • Economic performance (building and material cost, labor cost, maintenance cost, external cost, etc.)
  • Social impact results (working hours and well-being of workers, health, and safety of building users, social impacts on of society and local communities, etc.)
• Recommendations and future research directions for building industry stakeholders on how to improve sustainability performance in hybrid (wood-concrete) and other types of multi-storey building.

Potential Applications and Industrial Benefits

With the growing numbers of hybrid (wood-concrete) multi-storey building being built currently and potentially in the future, this methodology and tool could be used to better understand the sustainability performance (i.e. both positive and negative impacts) on the environmental, social and economic aspects of their buildings.

This certainly could help stakeholders (i.e. SQI and SHQ) and collaborator (i.e. FPInnovations) to understand the improvements that could be applied in building to have better sustainability performances.

Rizal.Taufiq.Fauzi@USherbrooke.ca