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Tallest Timber Tower Tipped for Tokyo

posted by Fnord666 on Tuesday February 20 2018, @09:46PM   
from the green-architecture dept.

-- OriginalOwner_ writes:

TreeHugger reports:

Sumitomo Forestry, an industry giant in Japan, [is] pivoting to plyscrapers and proposing a 70-story, 350 meter (1148') tower for the Marunouchi district in Tokyo. It's called W350, the plan being that it will be finished in 2041, the 350th anniversary of the founding of the company.

[...] Using a hybrid 9:1 ratio of wood to steel, Sumitomo Forestry aims to replace concrete, which is one of the world's largest carbon footprint contributors. The skyscraper would be a 70-floor mixed-use building that would include a hotel, office space, commercial space, and residences. Wrap-around balconies at different intervals would be planted with lush wildlife. And greenery would extend throughout the entire complex, creating a vertical forest where humans and wildlife can flourish.

[...] It is a brace tube structure, "a structural system that forms a cylindrical shell (brace tube) with columns / beams and braces. By placing braces diagonally in a set of shafts assembled with columns and beams, it prevents the building from deforming against lateral forces such as earthquakes and wind."

The images are beautiful.

Previously: Super Wood Could Replace Steel
The Case for Wooden Skyscrapers
Can You Build A Safe, Sustainable Skyscraper Out Of Wood?

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Original Submission

• Re:Towering inferno, indeed.... Re:Towering inferno, indeed.... (Score: 4, Interesting) by zocalo on Tuesday February 20 2018, @10:12PM (2 children)

  by zocalo (302) on Tuesday February 20 2018, @10:12PM (#640891)

  You do realise that a lot of fire doors are made out of wood, right? With the right density and treatment they can easily withstand a decent blaze for at least an hour (FD60 rating), and it doesn't matter what your building is made of - it's still burning away after an hour, then it's probably going to be a write-off anyway. Wood also has a lot more resilience against tremors than concrete, something that might be quite relevant for a structure in Japan, and longevity isn't much of a problem once the timber has settled - it almost assumes a petrified state, with 1,000+ year old timbers to be found in numerous buildings across Europe and Asia. Provided they can get the necessary structural strength and allow sufficient time for evacuation, this might actually be a better choice than more contemporary materials like steel, glass, and concrete - all of which have high carbon footprints.

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• Re:Towering inferno, indeed.... (Score: 3, Interesting) by frojack on Tuesday February 20 2018, @10:34PM

  by frojack (1554) on Tuesday February 20 2018, @10:34PM (#640902) Journal

  An hour long fire is pretty normal for fires in large buildings. It takes half that long just to get fire fighters to the scene, and up the stairs. Yet most of these buildings are saved. Even if one apartment is totally gutted by fire.

  And maybe wood buildings would be saved as well. But the water used for firefighting also extracts a toll on wood, but not so much concrete and steel.
  I'd fear water more than fire. Fire you put out and replace parts. Water gets everywhere, and you have rot showing up in hidden places for 20 years.

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• Re:Towering inferno, indeed.... (Score: 2) by fliptop on Wednesday February 21 2018, @04:50AM

  by fliptop (1666) on Wednesday February 21 2018, @04:50AM (#641041) Journal

  You do realise that a lot of fire doors are made out of wood, right?

  Yes and no. The outer veneer may be wood, but the inner layers are typically made of gypsum.

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