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Planning for new NEST units picking up speed
![https://www.empa.ch/documents/56164/915460/DigitalFabrication.jpg/e6feaaf1-f926-449b-be5d-281d326bd8de?t=1479909290000](https://www.empa.ch/documents/56164/915460/DigitalFabrication.jpg/e6feaaf1-f926-449b-be5d-281d326bd8de?t=1479909290000)
Growing building materials and waste as a resource
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The planning on other units is also in full swing: an east-facing home environment for two people is to be constructed on the second floor, where a consortium comprising Dirk E. Hebel’s ETH Zurich chair, the Institute for Lightweight Structures and Conceptual Design (ILEK) at the University of Stuttgart and the Werner Sobek Group will tackle topics related to urban mining. Construction is scheduled to begin in the second quarter of 2017. Besides a supporting structure where the individual components can be recycled without losing any value when removed, the unit will use waste as a source of materials and utilize prototypical products with a view to exploring the potential of this material resource.
The same goes for so-called “cultivated building materials” – materials composed of fungal components and organic waste that can grow in any choice of forms – which are to be integrated in the unit in a second phase. The entire unit is, therefore, to be constructed in such a way that it can be re-used fully as a materials store after demolition. In order to actually be able to exhaust the urban mine in future, an overview of the material flows and the “stock” is required. The Urban Mining and Recycling unit aims to pave the way for the creation of a corresponding 4D cadastral plan.
Detailed information on the innovation objects in the Urban Mining and Recycling unit is available here.
Robots on the building site and for bespoke prefabrication
The National Center of Competence in Research (NCCR) “Digital Fabrication” based at ETH Zurich is working on another unit. The researchers’ common goal is to combine digital technologies seamlessly with the physical construction process. NEST serves as a real-world test environment for completely novel on-site fabrication and bespoke digital prefabrication technologies. The former involves using the building site robot In situ Fabricator, which will build a steel wire mesh on the building site within the scope of the new construction technology Mesh Mould. At the same time, this mesh will serve as formwork and reinforcement for a supporting concrete wall on the unit’s second floor. In bespoke digital prefabrication, non-standardized, highly integrated wooden construction elements that together will form the unit’s third floor will be produced at the world’s largest architecture and robotics lab at ETH Zurich. Construction on the Digital Fabrication unit on NEST’s top platform is due to commence in the spring of 2017 and be completed in 2018.
Detailed information on the innovation objects in the Digitale Fabrication unit is available here.