Five tonnes for sustainable concrete
D-USYS
Two cubic sculptures of one metre dimensions, made from five tonnes of concrete. One cube is stacked on the other, slightly rotated from the axis of the lower cube. With this concrete sculpture on the ETH Zurich Hönggerberg campus, five environmental sciences students draw attention to the use of recycled concrete.
The project is part of the course "Environmental Problem Solving" in the Environmental Sciences programme at ETH Zurich. The students had spent a semester researching the subject of recycling in building construction. After studying another semester on the subject of "Methodology of Problem Solving", they have now turned their project into reality.
"I am pleased that the students have chosen a form of art to showcase their measures," says Urs Brändle, a teaching specialist at D-USYS and co-developer of the course. This is exactly what lecturers want from students: independently developed, perhaps unconventional approaches to solving complex problems.
Recycled concrete generally underused
In Switzerland, 80 million tonnes of building materials are used annually. "Only 20 percent of this is extracted from dismantling materials. The potential is far from exhausted," summarises Ayla Strozzega, spokeswoman for her group. Her concrete blocks are intended to attract the attention of passers-by. Each cube weighs 2.5 tonnes and is of one cubic metre volume. One cube is made from recycled concrete and the other from primary concrete, though this is not visually distinguishable. On the upper cube, there are panels that reveal surprising facts about primary and recycled concrete. For example, one says: "If you lined up a herd of elephants from here to New Zealand, how much would they weigh? Roughly 15 million tons. The material from the dismantling of buildings, which accumulates annually in Switzerland, weighs just as much."
ETH Zurich is a place where future architects, engineers and builders hang out. In other words, these are the people who will eventually decide on the choice of new building materials in the future. The five students therefore hope that their sculpture will stimulate discussion and motivate their fellow students to work towards increasing sustainability in construction.
The concrete sculpture will remain on Joseph-von-Deschwanden-Platz in front of the HCI building on the Hönggerberg campus until 3 July.