Schools, airports, high-rise towers: architects urged to get bamboo-ready'

"For many years, bamboo has been mostly known as the favourite food of giant pandas, but a group of engineers say it's time we took it seriously as a building material, too. This week the Institution of Structural Engineers called for architects to be bamboo-ready as they published a manual for designing permanent buildings made of the material, in an effort to encourage low-carbon construction and position bamboo as a proper alternative to steel and concrete."

"Bamboo has already been used for a number of boundary-pushing projects around the world. At Terminal 2 of Kempegowda international airport in Bengaluru, India, bamboo tubes make up the ceiling and pillars. The Ninghai bamboo tower in north-east China, which is more than 20 metres tall, is claimed to be the world's first high-rise building made using engineered bamboo. The Arc at the Green School in Bali, Indonesia."

"The use of composite bamboo shear walls have proved to be resilient against earthquakes and extreme weather in countries such as Colombia and the Philippines, where sustainable, disaster-resilient housing has been built with locally sourced materials. The construction industry accounted for one-third of global carbon emissions in 2022, with more than half of that being a result of the use of cement and cementitious materials."

Bamboo is being promoted as a permanent building material and a low-carbon alternative to steel and concrete. Engineered bamboo has been used in airport terminals, a more-than-20-metre Ninghai high-rise, and the Arc gymnasium at the Green School in Bali. Composite bamboo shear walls have demonstrated resilience to earthquakes and extreme weather in Colombia and the Philippines, enabling sustainable, disaster-resilient housing from locally sourced materials. The construction sector produced one-third of global carbon emissions in 2022, much from cement use, creating demand for low-carbon materials as urbanisation increases. Bamboo grows in three to six years, offering faster renewability than timber.

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