This month at Bryden Wood...

1. Satwinder Samra on this month's Built Environment Matters podcast

Don’t miss the latest episodes of our Built Environment Matters podcast where we talk with Satwinder Samra about opening doors and increasing diversity in architecture, the importance of listening, and how his students make him optimistic for the sector.

'If we have those different voices, actually at the table, when we're designing new parts of towns or looking at housing projects, they will bring a different life perspective and a different set of experiences, which, I think, make the practice of architecture more rounded and less myopic.' - Satwinder Samra


Out now on our website, or on all good podcast players: https://bit.ly/diversityinarchitecture

2. Repowering Coal Design Innovation

We're working with TerraPraxis, a non-profit organisation focused on action for climate and energy, on their ‘Repowering Coal’ initiative. ‘Repowering Coal’ will deliver a substantial portion of the clean electricity required to achieve Net Zero by 2050 by replacing coal-fired boilers at existing power plants with Generation IV Advanced Modular Reactors (AMRs) which will be ready for deployment by 2027. 

Bryden Wood has created a new digital design platform and construction solution that will make this possible at scale and speed. 

A standardised but customisable heat transfer and storage system allows the new, small nuclear systems to ‘plug in’ to existing coal plant infrastructure which will deliver a capital cost saving of 28- 35% (compared to a new nuclear plant) and doesn’t require major reworking of the existing energy grid. 

Standardisation will address the differing requirements for a wide variety of AMRs, site layouts, and energy and heat demand. The component-based design enables the plant to be reconfigured and expanded to accommodate different numbers of AMRs while adhering to Generation IV safety and regulation standards.


Read more: https://bit.ly/3H3xsyN
 

3. On-site versus Off-site construction

The focus on off-site prefabrication is increasing as the construction industry seeks to reap the benefits of lower costs, shorter delivery timescales, less waste, more productive site labour, better build quality, and improved health and safety. In this article our Asia-Pacific Lead, Adam Jordan, explores when construction should go off-site and when it should not, taking a deeper dive into the benefits DfMA and off-site construction can bring to a construction project, and explaining why construction sites would benefit from being more like factories.


To learn more: https://bit.ly/AJoffsite

4. Mark Bryden at ISG

Co-founder Mark Bryden joined ISG and a panel of fellow built environment experts to discuss the opportunities and challenges of mega scheme decarbonisation:

‘We think that designers have to become experts in managing data, because that's where you find out what you're really achieving and you can iterate much quicker.’

Read a summary of the discussion here: https://bit.ly/MBatISG