A Biomimetic Structural Form: Emulating Nature’s Structural Forms to Develop an Environmentally Effective Paradigm for Tall Buildings
Date
2024-01-16
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Abstract
In light of climate change concerns and the relentless quest to reduce the earth’s environmental degradation, the environmental development of tall buildings is part of this endeavour to ensure their continuity as a typology. Minimising the negative environmental impact of tall buildings is vital to meeting the criteria of global sustainable development, which entails defining the issue of environmental impact, selecting a development area and approach, formulating a solution, and then examining the outcomes. Due to their exceptional height, which requires the use of more materials and energy to meet functional and structural obligations compared to low-rise buildings, the environmental impact associated with their construction appears more significant than their operation, especially following the technological development of operating systems in the last few decades. The potential of the structural form to accommodate various demands throughout their history allows the development of the environmental dimension of tall buildings through its prominent role no different in this case as well. Given the inadequacy of current technical practices to bring about real environmental development, nature is seen as an alternative source of knowledge for sustainable development where biomimicry is the method embraced for this purpose. Accordingly, the biomimetic structural form (B SF) is put forward as an ‘effective paradigm’ bringing about the required development in tall buildings to cross over the green threshold (GT), a hypothetical level specifying the environmental target of development. The development of the paradigm is based on what organisms have evolved of solutions, strategies, and principles over time to guarantee their sustainability within their environment. Simply, this is a leap towards ultimate solutions without taking the same amount of time. The B SF is the biomimetic development of the architectural and structural dimensions of the structural form, which in turn contributes to the development of its environmental dimension and that of the entire tall building. The success of the B SF in crossing the GT thus reveals the capacity of a tall building to fulfil the survival environmental level (pre-sustainability) and the quality of the building to proceed towards achieving overall sustainability, usually associated with the use of typical supporting sustainability systems.
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Architecture, Environmental Design, Biomimicry, Biomimetics, Tall Buildings, Structural Form, Biomimetic Structural Form, Architectural Design, Biomimetic Design, Sustainability, Sustainable Design, Environmental Performance, Architectural Development, Architectural Engineering, Structural Development, Bio-inspired Design, Emulation of Nature
Citation
Al-Sehail, O. Q. (2024). A biomimetic structural form: emulating nature’s structural forms to develop an environmentally effective paradigm for tall buildings (Doctoral thesis, University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada). Retrieved from https://prism.ucalgary.ca.