{"id":21339,"date":"2017-06-23T09:33:42","date_gmt":"2017-06-23T07:33:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ferrovial.com\/blog\/en\/?p=21339"},"modified":"2025-12-12T11:23:20","modified_gmt":"2025-12-12T10:23:20","slug":"future-of-construction-building-materials","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ferrovial.com\/blog\/en\/2017\/06\/future-of-construction-building-materials\/","title":{"rendered":"What building materials will we be using in 2050?"},"content":{"rendered":"

We tend to think that reality is a given, and imagine that it will remain as it is forever, that our level of civilisation will continue into the future. This has been the case throughout history, for every civilisation ever studied.<\/p>\n

However, we are now at a point in history where technical progress<\/strong> happens so quickly that saying now what the future will be like will no doubt bring us a surprise or two. And so we could well ask ourselves the question: when it comes to the future of construction, what building materials will we be using in 2050?<\/p>\n

Construction materials used to date<\/strong><\/h2>\n

During the life of the first societies or clans (in the Palaeolithic age), hominids abandoned their caves to explore the world. And thus the first temporary houses emerged, as shelters or huts made using branches, skins and small logs<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

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Drawing of the Terra Amata hut (close to Nice, France), towards 500,000 B.C. Source: Jos\u00e9-Manuel Benito.<\/p><\/div>\n

It seems amazing that for half a million years<\/a> this was the type of construction that prevailed. Compared to modern housing blocks made of concrete and steel<\/strong> (21st<\/sup> century), use of these materials went on for 5,000 times longer.<\/p>\n

Towards the year 6,000 B.C., mud and clay<\/strong> began to take over what we now call the Middle East. It was used in the form of an unbaked brick of clay mixed with straw (probably waste from the harvests). This allowed for more complex constructions and better insulation from the heat, and also allowed building at different levels.<\/p>\n

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Ziggurat of Ur, dated at between 5,000 and 4,500 B.C. Photo from 2006. Source: Wikipedia.<\/p><\/div>\n

The civilizations existing at the time began to make gigantic constructions. The Ziggurat of Ur is one example, where a combination of rock<\/strong> for the foundations, clay<\/strong> for the inside and baked bricks for the outer walls was used. In addition to bitumen<\/strong><\/a> as mortar and reeds, bamboo and ropes <\/strong>for scaffolding<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Up until the decline of the Roman Empire, quarried rock (granite, sandstone, marble<\/strong>) was used in official buildings, whilst baked bricks<\/strong> and wood<\/strong> with iron nails<\/strong> for joints were used in houses.<\/p>\n

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Baked bricks with symbols from the Legio XXII Primigenia (22nd fortunate legion). Source: Harmann Linge.<\/p><\/div>\n

Over the years, stone (in many cases, acquired<\/em> from previous buildings) and wood continued to be used. In the 19th<\/sup> century, the production of steel<\/strong> and the growth of cities resulted in the building of blocks of houses reinforced with pre-tensioned concrete<\/strong> and metal beams.<\/p>\n

Today we continue to use this technique and very similar materials for our ordinary buildings. And, as with all the cultures that came before us, we think that these will be the building materials of the future<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

The future of construction<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Some possible building materials of the future<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Materials have been a difficult sticking point from the moment the laws of elasticity were discovered. Before that, everything was simply a question of trial and error<\/a>. Afterwards, it was all about scientific methods, trials in test tubes, and materials science.<\/p>\n

But it has only been in recent years that nanotechnology has allowed us to go deep into the heart of atoms, so that we have envisaged not just the material, but the shape of that material as an essential part of materials behaviour<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

3D-printed graphene<\/strong><\/h4>\n

For a time, graphene has been considered as one of the strongest artificial materials on Earth. However, graphene occurs as sheets or flakes, which renders its use in construction rather complicated, if not altogether absurd.<\/p>\n

Towards the beginning of 2017, a team of engineers from the MIT published this article to present<\/a> a three-dimensional structure <\/strong>which, if built with graphene, would be 5% the weight of steel but 10 times stronger.<\/p>\n