SUSTAINABLE CONSTRUCTION
TARMAC’S SOLUTION GUIDES HELP CUSTOMERS DELIVER A SUSTAINABLE BUILT ENVIRONMENT
New Solutions Guides on ‘T Blocks’, ‘Concrete Frame Construction with Special Concretes’, ‘Steel Frame Construction with Special Concretes’, ‘Quick Drying Flowing Cementitious Screeds’, ‘ and ‘Low Carbon Infrastructure Solutions’ have been launched, to support the use of our unique solutions by helping our customers deliver a more sustainable built environment.
These new solution guides join the existing library of guides covering Sustainable Drainage Systems (SuDS), Permeable Concrete, Permeable Asphalt, Passive Solar Design, Decorative Concrete, Underfloor Heating, Low Shrink Industrial Floors, A guide to BREEAM, Low Thermal Conductivity Concrete and Vaulted Ceilings.
Each Solution Guide is designed to help inform our customers and clients of the benefits that our products can provide when incorporated into a project as part of a wider construction solution. The aim of guides is to help facilitate early engagement with our customers so they can take advantage of the expertise and skills we have in Tarmac surrounding our products and their sustainable use.
Across the business the Solution Guides have been used to have more informed conversations with our customers and to support their decisions around suitable solutions to implement. Within the Readymix business the Underfloor Heating Solution Guide has recently been used to support Countryside Properties in the construction of their gold standard apartments in a new London development. The apartments themselves have been constructed with a high proportion of glass facades, limiting wall space for the inclusion of traditional radiators and also limiting floor space for furniture.
Glanville Norman, Readymix National Product Support Manager, said: “We were approached by Countryside Properties to supply them with a traditional screed for their project, however through discussions their challenge with installing heating was identified and we were able to introduce them to underfloor heating as an alternative.
“We used the Underfloor Heating Solution Guide to highlight the benefits that it could bring but more importantly how the solutions we offer through our flowing screed range could further enhance its performance.””
In order for underfloor heating to be used in conventional designs the depth of screed needs to be increased, increasing the total depth of the floor. This results in more screed being required and would also increase the height of the building by 300mm to accommodate this additional depth over 6 floors.
Using the Underfloor Heating Solution Guide the customer was introduced to the Topflow Screed A Thermio solution which enables a thinner screed to be laid, only increasing floor depth by 5mm rather than 20mm allowing the underfloor heating solution to be incorporated whilst maintaining the original building design height and increasing resource efficiency.
The move to an underfloor heating system using Topflow Screed A Thermio enabled significant savings to be made in the materials used to construct the apartment and also removed a potential risk to the programme associated by avoiding the need to increase building height. Countryside Properties were also able to make better use of their low heat biomass boilers as Topflow Screed A Thermio has better thermal characteristics than traditional screeds. This allows the heating system to be run at a lower temperature, delivering cost savings over conventional radiators. Both these aspects achieved additional BREEAM points and helped achieve the assessment target.
The Solution Guides are available for all customers on the Tarmac website
View our Solutions Guides