Canadian PI: Dr. Philippe Bocher
Canadian Institution: École de technologie supérieure (ÉTS)
Indian PI: Lakshmi Narayan Ramasubramanian
Indian Institution: Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Delhi
Project Summary:
Producing one tonne of steel generate 1.67 tonnes of CO2! On an average, 40-45 tonnes of steel is used for 1000 square feet of build up area in urban constructions. Once the building is demolished, the used steel loses its shape and cannot be reused for constructions is discarded as steel scrap. It is quite evident that unless steels used in construction are recycled, it will lead to unacceptable wastage of raw natural resources. In order to tackle this problem, effort should be made to recycle steel from scrap to save energy and reduce CO2 emissions. The standard steel parts are sheets and bars that have to be cut and machined for fabricating construction materials, leading again to material attrition and wastage.
In this context, and because Additive Manufacturing processes have been significantly developed lately, the possibility of using Wire Arc Additive Manufacturing (WAAM) in construction became evident to the PI from the Indian team. Thanks to WAAM, structures can be built to the desired shape and size by using a robotic arm attached with a metal inert gas (MIG) welding setup. It is possible to use many kinds of steel wires as feed, design optimized geometry, and reduce material wast. The dimensional accuracy of the printed structure and ability of the method to make complex shapes reduces the material waste and open new possibilities in design. Moreover, the mechanical and structural properties of the material built by this method matches well with those built via conventional manufacturing. By combining the steel recycling in the form of wires and WAAM, the emission of carbon can be mitigated significantly in the construction industry. From this collaboration, the issues related to using recycled steel to produce structural parts by WAAM will be addressed, reducing the carbon footprint and building structure at a lower cost. Affordable housing is a challenge in India as well as in Canada, in particular compliance with Carbon footprint reduction. One solution is to us modular construction with WAAM steel joints as a smart and innovative manufacturing strategy to fabricate high robust building. Any progress in this field will further support new building strategies to provide affortable, easy to construct, and eventually portable accommodations to adapt against epidemics/natural disasters/extreme weather conditions.
