SIBANG
KAJA, Indonesia - Strong, light and cheaper than steel poles, bamboo is
ubiquitous across Asia as scaffolding.
So much so
that in recognition of the material's versatility, the Indonesian island of
Bali has made it an emblem of sustainable construction, replacing buildings of
concrete and steel with far greener alternatives.
An entire
school, luxury villas and even a chocolate factory are the latest structures to
rise from bamboo skeletons as the plant's green credentials and strength are
hailed.
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| A
general view a a roof of a chocolate factory constructed from bamboo at a village in Sibang, Badung regency on Bali island in this photograph taken on June 4, 2012. (AFP Photo/Sonny Tumbelaka) |
Erected in
the village of Sibang Kaja between the resort island's smoggy capital Denpasar
and the forests of Ubud, the factory is the initiative of specialty food firm
Big Tree Farms, which claims the 2,550-square-metre (27,500-square-foot)
facility is the biggest commercial bamboo building in the world.
"Bamboo
is unmatched as a sustainable building material. What it can do is
remarkable," Big Tree Farms co-founder Ben Ripple, 37, told AFP.
"It
grows far more quickly than timber and doesn't destroy the land it's grown
on," said Ripple, an American from Connecticut. "Our factory can be
packed up and moved in days, so if we decided to shut it down one day, we're
not going to damage the rice paddies we sit on."
The 100
hectares (247 acres) of paddies sit inside a so-called "bamboo
triangle," with the factory, school and villas standing at each of the
three points.
Such
ambitious bamboo projects in Bali are mostly driven by eco-conscious
foreigners.
With
studies showing construction to be one of the world's least sustainable
industries - eating up around half of the globe's non-renewable resources -
sustainable construction is slowly taking root around the world.
It is among
the key topics for discussion at the Rio+20 United Nations Conference on
Sustainable Development, which opens June 20 in Rio de Janeiro.
In Sibang,
the tawny brown bamboo buildings with their grass thatched roofs appear to be
rising from the earth.
The
three-storey chocolate factory is pieced together using a complex system of
scissor trusses and bolts, thanks to clever architecture.
It
resembles the traditional longhouses found on Borneo island and was made with
more than 18,000 metres (59,000 feet) of bamboo from Bali and Java.
At Sibang's
nearby Green School, the 240 students - most of them children of expatriates -
learn in semi-outdoor classrooms decked with bamboo furniture.
The school,
which opened in 2008 and was the magnet for the other two projects, has 25
bamboo buildings, the main one being a stilt-structure constructed with 2,500
bamboo poles, or culms.
"In
Hong Kong and China, they make new skyscrapers of concrete and glass using
bamboo scaffolding. But here, the workmen stood on steel scaffolding to build
this bamboo building. That's always seemed funny to me," said Green School
admissions head Ben Macrory, from New York.
"In
most parts of Asia, bamboo is seen as the poor man's timber."
Not,
however, in Sibang, where the bamboo villas that nestle between the palm trees
are worth US$350,000 to US$700,000 (S$450,000 to S$899,000) each.
Like
decadent treehouses for adults, they have semi-outdoor areas and include innovative
bamboo flooring that resembles smooth timber and jellybean-shaped coffee tables
made from thin bamboo slats.
Bamboo -
technically a grass - has been used in building for centuries because of its
impressive strength-to-weight ratio.
Jules
Janssen, an authority on bamboo in the Netherlands, says that the weight of a
5,000-kilogram (11,000-pound) elephant can be supported by a short bamboo stub
with a surface area of just 10 square centimetres (1.5 square inches).
One reason
bamboo is so environmentally-friendly is the speed at which it grows, according
to Terry Sunderland, a scientist at the Centre for International Forestry
Research in Indonesia.
"In
China, eucalyptus can grow at three to four metres (10-13 feet) a year, which
is very impressive for timber. But building-quality bamboo will grow between
six and 10 metres (20-33 feet) in that time," he said.
And unlike
trees that rarely grow back once felled, bamboo will continue to produce new
shoots even after cutting.
But even
bamboo has its drawbacks.
Without
intensive treatment, it is prone to rotting after exposure to water. It also
catches fire relatively easily, which is why many countries limit bamboo
structures to just a few storeys.
Ripple
acknowledged that building with bamboo was not foolproof, but expressed
optimism that the technology to protect it from the elements will improve.
"A
friend we work with here always says bamboo needs a hat, rain jacket and
boots," he said. "We're lacking on the rain jacket a bit, but we're
looking at non-toxic materials to give it some protection."
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