Sustainable bearing structures

Publisher Summary The bearing structure is responsible for the second largest part of the environmental load of the building and the energy consumption is responsible for the greater part, assuming the life span of a building is 75 years. The bearing structure consists of the foundation, columns, beams, floor and roof structure, and sometimes walls and facades. The horizontal elements of the bearing structure, consisting of the floor, and roof structure and beams, are causing about 80% of the environmental load of the total bearing structure. Especially the floor and roof structure play a very important role, therefore, optimization of the floor structure leads to an important environmental improvement of the whole office building. A type of ecologically or economically structural material required for a building depends on the span the building design needs. For each floor type, for structural spans between 4.8 and 16.8m, the environmental load and cost have been determined, resulting in the determination of best solutions for different spans.