Simon Smith, a director of engineers Ramboll and one of the UK’s leading exponents of cross-laminated timber panel construction (CLT), has been named a building industry ‘green guru’.
Mr Smith took the title of ‘Green Guru Engineer’ in an online vote run by Building magazine. The competition was launched to recognise “the most influential people driving forward the delivery of a more sustainable built environment”.
Among the projects Mr Smith has been involved in was the SmartLife building college centre in Cambridge, which included wings using CLT and glulam frame.
In an interview for TTJ’s sister title Timber & Sustainable Building on Ramboll’s work on the St John Fisher School in Peterborough, Mr Smith said that he actively encouraged clients to use CLT and even switch to it from other materials because of its high levels of embodied CO2 and other environmental merits.
The school used over 1,000m³ of CLT and Ramboll has since gone on to work on the new Norwich Academy which comprises over 3,000m³ of the material.
