Fulcrum House – Towards a Sustainable Composite Architecture

Technical Report · Wed Feb 01 04:00:00 EST 2023

DOI:https://doi.org/10.2172/1922708· OSTI ID:1922708

Gandia, Augusto ^[1]; Goulthorpe, Mark ^[1]

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1. Massachusetts Inst. of Technology (MIT), Cambridge, MA (United States)

In the last decades, the accessibility to digital fabrication technologies positioned composites as an affordable, structurally efficient and low-maintenance alternative to traditional mineral-based and high-energy materials. Of special interest are carbon nanotubes (CNT) and carbon foam (CFoam) from methane and coal pyrolysis respectively, as an environmentally friendly substitute to glass and carbon fiber. This paper presents the design of a principled single-family house, as a first case study to identify the constraints of such a material system, including technology gap, techno-economic and life cycle assessment, as well as building code requirements. In turn, the investigation proposes a suitable design-to-fabrication workflow, which potentially could bring CNT and CFoam materials to the construction of buildings.

• Research Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Cambridge, MA (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE Office of Fossil Energy and Carbon Management (FECM)
• DOE Contract Number: FE0032082
• OSTI ID: 1922708
• Report Number(s): DOE-MIT--32082
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

01 COAL, LIGNITE, AND PEAT
36 MATERIALS SCIENCE
42 ENGINEERING
Carbon Nanotubes and Carbon Foam
Computational Design
Digital Fabrication