Publication

TERRE project: interplay between unsaturated soil mechanics and low-carbon geotechnical engineering

Related publications (19)

Reuse of concrete components in new construction projects: Critical review of 77 circular precedents

Maléna Bastien Masse, Célia Marine Küpfer, Corentin Jean Dominique Fivet

Extracting pieces of concrete from obsolete buildings and reusing them, as is, in new assemblies is today rarely considered a strategy for improving the sustainability of the construction sector. By delaying the crushing of concrete into aggregates and avo ...

2023

A Reuse-Ready Timber Slab-and-Column System for Modular Building Structures

Corentin Jean Dominique Fivet, Jan Friedrich Georg Brütting, Alex-Manuel Muresan, Jonas Warmuth, Edisson Xavier Estrella Arcos

The construction industry is a significant contributor to resource consumption and waste generation. To address this issue, component reuse has been proposed as a way to prevent valuable building elements from being discarded and avoid producing new ones. ...

Curran Associates, Inc.2023

Experimental testing and structural analysis of composite tile – reinforced concrete domes

Savvas Saloustros

Conventional formworks for concrete curved shells either are expensive, complex and wasteful or have formal restrictions. Using tile vaults (also known as timbrel, Guastavino, thin-tile or Catalan vaults) as stay-in-place formwork for concrete shells could ...

2023

Trends in mitigation of industrial waste: Global health hazards, environmental implications and waste derived economy for environmental sustainability

Edgard Gnansounou

Majority of industries, in order to meet the technological development and consumer demands generate waste. The untreated waste spreads out toxic and harmful substances in the environment which serves as a breeding ground for pathogenic microorganisms thus ...

ELSEVIER2022

Design and temporal issues in Soil Bioengineering structures for the stabilisation of shallow soil movements

Giovanni De Cesare, Massimiliano Schwarz

In the last decades, soil bioengineering has gained considerable popularity worldwide, especially in hillslope, riverbank, and earth embankment stabilisation works. The use of plants as a building material transfers the plant multifunctionality within engi ...

2021

Upcycling Space Structures (Preface to special issue)

Olivier Baverel, Corentin Jean Dominique Fivet

The construction industry’s contribution to the deterioration of Earth’s ecosystem is huge. 11% of all anthropic greenhouse gas emissions worldwide are due to the construction, demolition, and transformation of buildings and infrastructure. Construction an ...

2021

Decision Framework to Balance Environmental, Technical, Logistical, and Economic Criteria When Designing Structures With Reused Components

Numa Joy Bertola, Célia Marine Küpfer, Corentin Jean Dominique Fivet, Jan Friedrich Georg Brütting

The reuse of structural components in new buildings has great potential to reduce the environmental impacts of the construction sector but remains uncommon practice. An obstacle to its wider implementation is the lack of robust assessment methods and decis ...

2021

A performance-driven simulation workflow for PV integration into the design process: application on an innovative building project in Switzerland

Sergi Aguacil Moreno

In the construction sector, the integration of active elements functioning both as building envelope material and on-site electricity generator is identified as a key measure to achieve the 2050 targets and carbon neutrality (Aguacil Moreno, 2019; Aguacil ...

2021

Scrutinizing the Circular Economy concept applied at the urban level: A contribution based on the analysis of urban circularity indicators, the categorization of Circular Economy interventions, and the identification of factors fostering the adoption of circular innovation

Valeria Superti

Problem. Our current economic systems are deemed unsustainable. Although a global issue, the objective of living in a sustainable society is increasingly an urban challenge, as a rising 50% of the world's population currently dwell in cities. To secure a b ...

EPFL2021

Geotechnical and environmental performance of retaining structures in unsaturated soils

Gianluca Speranza

Presently, environmental issues are considered as critical aspects concerning the market competitiveness in the building and construction sector. However, the construction sector is regarded as one of the main areas contributing to CO2 emissions and resour ...

EPFL2020

Design and construction of a railway bridge in reinforced UHPFRC – World’s first UHPFRC bridge on a main railway line

Eugen Brühwiler

On November 11, 2017, the world's first railway bridge built in reinforced UHPFRC on a main railway line lane was put in service. The building project of the Swiss Federal Railways was realized within a replacement project of a double‐lane railway bridge o ...

2019

Innovation capacity of the agricultural sector: network of productive interactions, knowledge transfer and differentiation mechanisms

Camille Marguerite Aouinait

Economic growth is increasingly explained and driven by knowledge acquisition and firmsâ capabilities to adapt to new evolving situations to fit economic, societal and environmental frames. Strategic behavior of private companies in differentiating and p ...

EPFL2019

Designing Energy-Efficient Façades to Meet Energy Transition Targets

Angela Clua Longas

The contemporary energy context can be considered as a period of energy transition, where the latest protocols focus on limiting greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and improving energy efficiency across the different energy consumption sectors. As the largest ...

EPFL2019

Fifth generation district energy systems for low carbon cities

Raluca-Ancuta Suciu

The focus and challenge for energy engineering in the context of rapid climate change is summarised by the Europe 20-20-20 targets, committing to a reduction in energy consumption of 20%. The most logical approach to achieve these goals is to target the mo ...

EPFL2019

Exploration of spatial structures made from reused elements and the design of optimal kits-of-parts

Corentin Jean Dominique Fivet, Jan Friedrich Georg Brütting, Gennaro Senatore

Reuse reduces raw material use, waste generation and energy consumption caused by building construction. A substantial share of these impacts is contributed by load-bearing systems be-cause of their mass- and energy-intensive production process. Therefore, ...

Taylor & Francis Group2019

Optimum Truss Design with Reused Stock Elements

Joseph Jean François Desruelle, Corentin Jean Dominique Fivet, Jan Friedrich Georg Brütting, Gennaro Senatore

This paper proposes the application of optimization techniques to design reticular structures made from a stock of reused elements. Still little explored, the reuse of structural components over multiple service lives has the potential to reduce the enviro ...

2018

Structural Design with Reclaimed Materials: an Elastic Gridshell out of Skis

Endrit Hoxha, Corentin Jean Dominique Fivet, Sofia Colabella

This paper presents the design and construction of a 36m2 gridshell, the rigidity of which is achieved through the bending of an initially flat grid of 210 reclaimed skis. The generated waste for its production is near zero as it is mostly built from disca ...

2017

Brevets de la maison en béton, 1892-1923 : visions d'une construction monolithique, d'Edison à Le Corbusier

Gia Bao Khue Aurélie Do-Tran

Looking back at the history of concrete houses around 1900, we can discover how reinforced concrete, initially tied to construction systems of renowned inventors (and other less known), is gradually becoming autonomous and a material on its own, highlighte ...

EPFL2017

Durability and fatigue performance of a typical cold-curing structural adhesive in bridge construction

Maria Savvilotidou

The science of adhesives and adhesion for structural connections has undergone significant development during the last few decades - and successfully so in a wide variety of industries. Recent applications of structural bonding are being adopted in the con ...

EPFL2017