Sustainable Structural Design

Efficient energy use during construction and operation of buildings and sustainable building design are important issues in both modern society and the engineering community. Innovative methods are needed to address the environmental impact, energy use and other sustainability issues faced during planning and design of buildings. This study investigates sustainable design methodologies, the relationships between structural system and the 2009 Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) rating system, the impact that project size and type can have on project sustainability, sustainable properties associated with construction materials (such as steel, cast-in-place concrete and prestressed/precast concrete) and computer programs aimed at determining the properties of sustainable structural design alternatives. This study investigates some sustainable structural design methodologies including minimizing material use, minimizing material production energy, minimizing embodied energy, life-cycle analysis/inventory/assessment and maximizing building reuse and presents their positive and negative sustainable qualities. This study discusses and reviews the categories of the 2009 LEED rating system in which points could be awarded to a project for sustainability of its structural frame. This study presents the role that project size and structural system-type play on aspects of sustainable design including the design and analysis phase, land use, investments in sustainable technologies, use of timber as a primary load bearing material and other sustainable issues. This study reviews the structurally applicable sustainable properties associated with structural steel, cast-in-place and prestessed/precast concrete. Finally, this study provides a review of life-cycle analysis computer programs focusing on three (Building for Environmental and Economic Sustainability (BEES) v4.0, SimaPRO v7.1 and Athena Impact Estimator v4.0) aimed at assessing the sustainability of design alternatives. This study determined that no single current sustainable design methodology can address all project sustainability issues at this time. Also, the LEED 2009 rating system does not reward projects for sustainable design of their structural systems in the same manner it does other aspects of design. It was determined that construction type and project size can have significant impact on sustainable opportunities for a project and that no single construction material is the most sustainable compared to others for all design types at this time. Finally, existing sustainability analysis software does not meet the current needs of its users in assessing design alternative sustainable properties and provides users with basic structural system comparisons, as exemplified by parametric studies using the Athena Impact Estimator v4.0. Advisors/Committee Members: Sezen, Halil.