By increasing the share of wood and other biomaterials in construction projects of the city, the authorities want to reduce the industry's dependence on steel and concrete. The production of which, as is known, involves serious CO emissions2. In the long term, this will help the capital of the Netherlands achieve the status of "climate neutrality" or zero emissions of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere already by 2050.
The HAUT tower is the tallest (72 m) wooden residential high-rise in Amsterdam. Visualization.
Courtesy of Team V Architectuur
In order for a new free-standing building to meet the conditions of the signed document and be considered wooden, it must be made of at least 80% wood. For high-rise residential buildings up to 10 floors high, this indicator decreases to 65%, and for residential buildings higher than 10 floors, it is at least 50%. As an alternative, the Green Deal Timber Construction timber agreement allows the use of other materials on a biological basis, for example, hemp fiber or cork.
Patch 22 in Amsterdam. Architecture: Frantzen et al Architecten. Photo: Luuk Kramer
The Amsterdam Institute for Advanced Urban Solutions (AMS Institute), which supported the implementation of the Green Deal Timber Construction project, has already calculated that such a step will lead to a reduction in carbon dioxide emissions in the city by approximately 220 tons per hour, which is equivalent to the average level of emissions of 000 houses. A significant reduction in nitrogen emissions is also expected.
Building for the sailing club Water Sport Club IJburg (WVIJ), Amsterdam, 2018. Architecture: Margulis Moormann Architects
It is known that almost 40% of all greenhouse gases in the world are produced not even by vehicles or gasoline engines, but by human-built buildings. Therefore, in order to reduce the figure, many architects today are again turning to the oldest building material on our planet - wood. Its ecological value and benefits are indisputable, but it has another unique property: they capture a large amount of carbon from the atmosphere and accumulate it inside the building, compensating for the latter's emissions during the entire life of the building. In other words, wooden structures are giant carbon sinks.
Wooden construction at the legislative level is encouraged not only in Amsterdam. The City Council of New York approved the use of solid wood for buildings with a height of up to 29,5 m. And the French government passed a law last year that all new public buildings must be made of 50% wood or other biomaterials. In addition, the signed agreement and request to become carbon-neutral will help the city in creating a closed-loop economy, since both wood and alternative bio-based materials are easily recycled and reused.