In March 2011, Arup together with HHS Planer + Architekten and Finnforest were announced official first prize winner of the E2 Timber Development Competition in Finland.
The jury was impressed by the clarity and simplicity of the construction method developed by the team: “E²volution offers many extremely interesting starting points for the industrialised production of multi-storey timber developments.”
The international two-stage competition ‘E2’, a reference to Economy and Ecology, was announced in October 2010 by the city of Kouvola and was set up for planning teams from architects, engineers and specialist timber contractors. The task was to develop a system for timber construction that would use the design and construction properties of the material as well as demonstrate the ecological and economic benefits in comparison to concrete construction. Participants were asked to present the architectural diversity and flexibility of the system with the help of a pilot project on a riverside site.
Arup’s timber competence team in Berlin consists of experts in the disciplines of structural engineering,building physics, fire engineering,façade engineering and materials consulting.
Reducing costs and gaining efficiency
The energy efficiency, convenience and fire protection of the awarded modular E²volution system are achieved by consistent layering of the internal cladding elements: The internal non-combustible surfaces contribute to the fire concept and to the acoustic performance as they are decoupled from the load bearing elements. The vapour barrier and the thermal line are always in the same plane of the wall build-up allowing robust and simple interfaces and a high air-tightness.
Local conifers as basis
The extraordinary strength and dimensional stability of the Finnforest Kerto® LVL (laminated veneer lumber) produced by Finnforest from local coniferous wood forms the basis of the system. With just three types of large-scale, prefabricated structural components, countless typologies and floor plans can be created. The high flexibility of the systemmaimises the life-cycle of the structure.
Wooden multi-storey construction
The E²volution system is designed to facilitate growth of wooden multi-storey construction as business. Only the large-scale primary load-bearing elements would be prefabricated during the pilot phase in the element factory, which is located roughly 200km away in Heinola, Finland.
Despite the somewhat higher production costs, the construction costs would be competitive in comparison to the steel-concrete construction method long established in Finland due to shorter construction time.
As the distribution of the system would be expanded in Nordic countries flexible elements such as exterior cladding, windows and installations could be integrated into the prefabrication process; this would further reduce costs by approximately 10%.
The potential for wood construction
Although the forest is Finland’s most important natural resource and almost 60Mm2 of wood are harvested every year, concrete has so far been almost the only construction material used to build multi-storey buildings in the country. The city of Kouvola, whose economy has been suffering from the downturn in the paper industry, has recognised the potential for wood construction.
In the E2 competition, there were two shared first prizes awarded. The Team Arup congratulates BIG/Copenhagen for winning the second first prize.