Australia’s first building to be constructed from cross-laminated timber could become a world-beater.
Construction firm Grocon has unveiled plans for a cross-lam apartment block in Melbourne which at 10-storeys will be one storey higher than the Stadthaus in north London, currently believed to be the world’s highest cross-lam structure.
The “Delta” Passive House building, containing 50 apartments, is designed to be carbon neutral.
The prefabricated FSC-certified structure will be shipped from Europe with a completion date expected in 2014.
David Waldren, Grocon general manager, described Delta as a quantum leap in terms of the Australian building industry.
“We want to go further than ever before in the development and construction industry,” he said.
“With the federal government’s announcement that there will be a carbon price from July 1, 2012, we must all be ready for a new way of living and working. The carbon-constrained economy is upon us.”
The Delta design/construction team is the same one that worked on the Pixel project – Grocon, studio 505 architects and sustainability consultants Umow Lai.
Pixel is currently the greenest building in Australia, achieving a perfect score of 105 from the Green Building Council of Australia.
