Green Dome

The freedom of form that the 3D printing process offers, combined with design techniques such as Generative Design (parametric design), gives designers and engineers the ability to make forms and structures that were previously not possible. Now that the development of our own the 3D concrete printer reached a consistent production quality, it is interesting to actually realize theoretical cases. One of the theoretical cases is a dome made of unique blocks which serves as a housing for a composter machine. The structure is intended to be placed outdoors and pilot localizing the composting of kitchen and garden biowaste.

The Green Dome is a concept developed by the Lectoraat Industrial Design whereby the 3D concrete print technology from Saxion, a composting technology from Twente Milieu and the innovation lab of Flow of Innovation come together in a business plan.

The Green Dome consists of a housing that can only be made by the unique advantages of the 3D concrete printer. There is a composter machine Jora JK 5100 which turns compost into green and garden waste within 2-3 weeks with daily capacity of 60 kg. The Green Dome was innitially intended to be self-sufficient with regard to, for example, water and energy in order to be deploy-able everywhere.

Within the project we conducted a research on the amount of waste gathered in the work/office space. Our findings state:

One person produces 0.1 kg of bio waste per day in an office environment and in company canteen approximately 0.2 kg per day. This corresponds to the amount of bio-waste from household waste = 0.26 kg per day according to the CBS. Moreover, the restaurant we worked with produces up to 22 kg of bio waste per day. This is more than expected and makes it worthwhile to separate and not to lose these precious resources.
The separation of bio-waste is positively received and accepted by the employees, but the existing waste bins are inconvenient to use.

Why the Green Dome as a case? Waste flow analyzes have shown that more than 30% of residual waste from households still consists of food waste and garden waste. Low-rise has a green container for this at home. For the high-rise buildings there is currently no solution for separating food waste and garden waste, which means that residents are forced to do this with the residual waste.

Various initiatives and tests are ongoing in the Netherlands to find a solution for separating food waste and garden waste in high-rise buildings. To date, no good solution has been found that is suitable for all high-rise buildings with a number of apartments from 10 to 500.

In 2015, we threw away 490 kilos of waste per year for every Dutch person. if we go for an average high-rise structure of between 50 and 250 people, then between 7000 and 37000 Kg of waste is produced per year. Separating If this waste no longer needs to be separated separately, this would be a considerable saving as well as fewer transport movements.

Various experiments were done with the form of the Dome. After all, we intended to have the form to follow the function and with our tools for parametric design (Rhino + Grasshopper), it was possible to create and compare many design suggestions by only changing a few parameters.

The circular aspect of the Green Dome is how we see one should plan and execute sustainable designs. Collecting and processing waste on the site reduces logistics movements and a circular neighborhood around the high-rise. The final product from the Dome in the form of ferment or compost can also be used directly in gardens or public spaces. Because the Green Dome supplies itself with energy and water, an independently functioning collection device is created that can be used in several places.

The final Dome shape consists of 58 unique blocks. The total weight of the structure is around 3 tonnes. After printing , several blocks were 3D scanned and compared in a digital environment in order to see deviations of the form due to the 3D printing technique. This step is a quality check that is yet needed in 3D printing of structural elements. In this way, the construction can be planned and executed better and easier.

CONSTRUCTION

The construction of the Dome required a custom scaffolding made by CNC Milling in FabLab Enschede. The crew built the entire structure in 4 days. The scaffolding was removed a week later. Stress test follows soon.

The Green Dome was subjected to stress-test on 09-March-2021. the strcuture withstood the load calculated according to the Eurocode for laterlal loads.