Sustainability

sustainability is not just a CATCHPHRASE 

Sustainability has been at the core of everything Andy has designed and built for many years, well before Precision Polished Concrete was established.

Not because it was the current "buzzword" in the building industry, but because it made sense.

How could living in a more comfortable home that was less expensive to run, had a whole of life cost saving and built from materials that had less impact on the environment be considered a bad thing?

Andy was amongst the first professionals in NSW to receive his GreenSmart Professional Accreditation as well as completing the MBA Green Living Program, and sees Precision Polished Concrete as a natural extension of his previous work.

While many of us share the same lofty ideals when it comes to sustainability, most of us also have the reality of a budget to contend with. The use of concrete as a primary building material is not going to go away anytime soon in Australia, despite its high embodied energy and environmental impact.

However, we can offset this high embodied energy to a large degree by using the concrete as a floor finish, rather than with other floor coverings that further increase the embodied energy and environmental impact of the building.

There is no other floor finish available that has as little embodied energy, nor environmental impact, than a Precision Polished Concrete floor using the Hiperfloor concrete polishing systems.

There are several reasons for this

1. The energy used to transform the concrete from a structural element to a completed floor finish is only a small percentage of the energy required to manufacture, transport and install any other floor finish.

2. As the Hiperfloor system does not include any kind of topical coatings, it allows the concrete to act as a very efficient thermal mass helping to regulate year round temperature differentials reducing the energy used to heat or cool the house, even in homes not designed using passive solar principles.

3. The highly polished finish causes the concrete to reflect visible light, further reducing the requirements for lighting.

4. The very long life of the concrete, far exceeding any other potential floor covering, means the whole of life embodied energy is greatly reduced.

5. The minimal maintenance requirements eliminate the requirements of harsh cleaning chemicals or the stripping, disposal and re-coating of potentially harmful coating systems.