3D Concrete Printed Residential Building for Low Cost Housing

Australia’s residential housing industry needs to increase supply and improve affordability while reducing waste and embodied carbon. At the same time, builders face challenges including increasing construction costs and skills shortages.

To address this, Ballarat builder Oasis Building Group is using state-of-the-art 3D concrete printing as a new building method. This technology can produce walls faster and with less formwork waste than traditional construction, while improving energy efficiency and allowing for the use of innovative low-carbon concrete mixes to reduce embodied carbon.

However, without data and certification demonstrating compliance with regulatory requirements, builders like Oasis face prohibitive costs from project-specific engineering assessments.

In this project, Swinburne University researchers have tested the structural performance of 3D-printed wall systems and generated the data needed to demonstrate compliance with the National Construction Code (NCC), helping Oasis seek the certification needed to scale the technology across multiple builds. Researchers have also provided data demonstrating the wall system’s thermal performance to support applications for Green Star certification.

PROJECT PARTNERS

• Oasis Building Group
• Swinburne University of Technology