Gulf Construction Online - BASF showcases key building solutions

UAE Focus

Neopor ... an innovative material for insulating walls and roofs.

BASF showcases key building solutions

01 February 2010

Insulation materials for buildings, black pigments for reducing surface heat and concrete admixtures that help lower carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions were some of the solutions that BASF displayed at the World Future Energy Summit in Abu Dhabi last month (January 18 to 21).

With its cost-efficient concepts for sustainable building, BASF highlighted that CO2 emissions can be substantially reduced in the construction and use of buildings and that living comfort is improved as well.

The fair was organised by the project company for the future Masdar City, the world’s first CO2-neutral and zero-waste city that is to be built by 2016 in Abu Dhabi.

Since August 2009, BASF has been the strategic partner for the construction of Masdar City and preferred supplier of building materials and system solutions. “The use of special BASF concrete admixtures in Masdar will help reduce CO2 emissions by up to 60 per cent,” says a spokesman for the company.

At the summit, BASF had set up a stand under the theme ‘Building sustainability — Your partner for sustainable construction solutions’, where it showcased its extensive range of products and systems developed to meet the requirements of the local construction industry while taking into account the architectural traditions and climatic conditions prevalent in the region.

“The construction and use of buildings play a crucial role in climate protection,” Dr Tilman Krauch, head of BASF’s Construction Chemicals division, said. “We provide our customers in the construction industry with highly efficient concepts both economically and ecologically.”

Some of the products showcased at the event included:

• Glenium Sky: BASF provides these high-performance plasticisers for the manufacture of concrete. The product ensures the quality of the concrete is preserved during transport; the concrete can be processed more easily at the building site on account of its fluidity; and the finished concrete structures have a high strength and a long life. Glenium Sky lowers CO2 emissions during the production of the concrete.

• Crystal Speed Hardening: This concept has been developed for contractors and precast producers. The core product of the concept is X-Seed 100, a unique hardening accelerator, which helps to speed up concrete hardening significantly at early stages (six to 12 hours), supporting at least double strength at low, ambient and heat curing temperatures.

• Versatile polyurethane plastics: Their uses range from the cladding of cold air pipes to coastal protection. In the Gulf region, the market segments of building and insulation offer a wide range of opportunities for the use of the polyurethane plastics Elastopor H and Elastopir of BASF’s Polyurethanes division in the form of sandwich elements, insulation boards and spray-applied foam.

• Neopor and Styrodur C: Neopor is an innovative material for insulating walls, roofs and floors. “By virtue of inbuilt infrared absorbers, Neopor has a better insulation performance than conventional insulation materials. Depending on the type and design of a house, at least 40 per cent of the cooling energy can be saved in this way and CO2 emissions lowered,” says the spokesman.
Further possibilities of protecting structures from heat, cold and moisture are provided by Styrodur C, which comprises green extruded polystyrene foam panels with air as cell gas.

• Senergy facade systems: These wall systems consist of multiple layers for insulating and protecting exterior surfaces. These solutions make it possible to cool buildings efficiently and thus reduce the consumption of energy, the spokesman says.

• Paliogen, Lumogen and Sicopal: BASF has developed these black pigments for deflecting heat from surfaces. Unlike the conventional carbon black pigments, they prevent the absorption of the invisible near infrared radiation, which accounts for more than 50 per cent of the incident solar energy. Field tests have shown that building materials incorporating the BASF pigments store only about half as much heat as conventional materials, says the spokesman.