RILEM Webinar: Materials and Structures for the African framework - challenges, innovation potentials, and research requirements

Speaker: Mrs. Nonkululeko Radebe, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), Karlsruhe, Germany and Dr. Dipl.-Ing. Wolfram Schmidt, Bundesanstalt für Materialforschung und -prüfung (BAM), Berlin, Germany

Host: Prof. Karen Scrivener, EPFL, Switzerland

Title: Materials and Structures for the African framework - challenges, innovation potentials, and research requirements

All over the African continent, there is a tremendous need for construction. Over the course of the next decades some African cities will be the most populated cities in the world, and infrastructure is urgently required. 80% of the future urban construction that will have been built in Africa by 2050 is yet to be built in the next 30 years. Since today, globally, the built environment already contributes to about 40% of the anthropogenic carbon emissions, the rapid construction demand in Africa requires the immediate implementation of sustainable construction solutions.

While a lot of challenges arise for the continent’s construction sector, in parallel enormous innovation potential can be unleashed. Africa is the only region in the world with a per-capita carbon emission below the critical threshold to limit global warming by 1.5 °C until 2050. This is an excellent starting position for the continent to pioneer greener construction technologies with more sustainable and resource saving materials.

The webinar will illuminate the specific boundary parameters for construction in Africa and introduce into a variety of specific solutions that can become part of a more environmentally, friendly and sustainable construction framework., including those that lie within materials and processing as well as within urban development, architecture and structures.