Education Today Education Today Magazine
BAM Construct UK has collaborated with Altro and Recofloor to achieve significant sustainability gains on a number of major school construction projects.
At Weldon Village Academy, a new purpose-built secondary school near Corby, BAM Construct UK built the state-of-the-art, three-storey facility to provide education, sport and recreation facilities for the community as well as the school population.
To ensure an overarching sustainable building, the interior materials were selected for, among other criteria, their reduced embodied carbon properties. This included the flooring throughout, which needed to provide recyclability and high slip-resistance for busy areas, such as corridors and classrooms. BAM Construct UK approached Altro, their supply chain partner, for support and guidance with specifying the correct floors.
Adhesive-free safety floor Altro XpressLay was specified for the corridors and classrooms, providing speed of installation and ease of maintenance ensuring the busy areas were returned to use quickly and completed to project timescales. Altro XpressLay is installed without adhesive or DPM, providing easy access to subfloors, and avoiding any unpleasant adhesive odours.
Like all Altro adhesive-free floors, it utilises a unique formulation for a quick fit without compromising on performance or durability. The revolutionary technology, featuring a studded surface on the underside of the floor, allows it to lie flat and perform like a traditionally adhered floor without the need for an adhesive. Floors can be installed and walked on the same day.
Recofloor, the UK’s first waste vinyl floor take back scheme, was introduced into the build, providing collection of clean vinyl offcuts for recycling. The vinyl offcuts collected from the 3,000 sqm of Altro XpressLay installed at Weldon Village Academy avoided 1.88 tonnes of embodied carbon emissions.
Sustainability was also high on the agenda for the new school extension at Holyrood Academy, Somerset. The architect initially specified traditional adhered flooring, but main contractor BAM saw the opportunity for time and cost savings as well as huge sustainability benefits by switching the specification to adhesive-free options. Altro Wood adhesive-free safety floor was specified for the dining area and Altro Cantata adhesive-free was specified for the corridors and communal areas, providing a safe, durable and decorative solution for the busy spaces.
David Lever, Altro’s Sustainability Manager, says: “There are many cost and time advantages to using Altro adhesive-free flooring, which requires no adhesive and no damp-proof membrane, but the saving in embodied carbon achieved by avoiding these elements is the real headline grabber. Figures produced by the team on the Holyrood Academy project showed that switching the specification from adhered to adhesive-free gave an approximate carbon-saving of 59%, preventing 3.89 tonnes of embodied carbon emissions.”
www.altro.com/uk/learn-and-engage/altro-guides/adhesive-free-floors
