Kristina Mjörnell

A Method for Including Moisture Safety in the Building Process

Many buildings, both new and old, suffer from moisture-related problems, with negative consequences on health, costs for rebuilding and lost confidence in the building industry. These problems could have been avoided if moisture issues had been focused on and dealt with throughout the building process. A method for including moisture safety in the building process has therefore been developed. The purpose of the method is to help all those involved to work with moisture safety activities and to document them in a structured way. The method includes a number of routines, templates and checklists for clients to formulate requirements for moisture safety and to follow up and document the measures employed by different participants. There are also tools for architects and design engineers, such as lists of references to literature, check lists and design examples to use for dry building design. For contractors, a number of routines have been developed for moisture control during construction. The method has been applied to a number of building projects. Based on experience from these projects, the method and the tools have been evaluated and revised. This paper presents the validated method and some associated tools that can be used in the building process.

Development of a decision support tool for sustainable renovation – a case study

Purpose – Building owners are encouraged to reduce the energy consumption both in order to contribute to national energy saving goals and to reduce the costs of heating and operation of buildings. However, it is important to pursue the most optimal strategy to achieve cost-effective energy use while maintaining other values. Building managers often do not have the time or expertise to make a proper evaluation of the available options, hence there is a need for practical methodologies for evaluation of renovation alternatives. The paper aims to discuss these issues. Design/methodology/approach – Renobuild, a systematic approach for evaluating renovation alternatives based on sustainability criteria are under development. It aims to compare renovation alternatives from an environmental, economic and social perspective. To verify the methodology it has been used to evaluate different renovation alternatives for a multi-family apartment building in Sweden. Findings – The study showed that building managers ar...

Experience from Using Prefabricated Elements for Adding Insulation and Upgrading of External Façades

At present, there are a number of rational prefabricated systems on the market for adding insulation and upgrading exterior walls and facades. A number of such systems were tested and evaluated by Swedish housing companies. This process showed that none of the solutions are fully developed and that, during the projects that were studied, much of the development work took place during the renovation project. The weak points of the systems were generally found to be the connections between the elements and the existing facade, and details such as windows. In several cases, the housing companies had problems with a lack of clarity regarding responsibilities, between those who were to deliver the system and those who were to install it, as well as the division of responsibility for connection and details, such as between a window and the existing building. It is crucial that such issues are solved before a system is designed, produced, and installed. There were also problems with inaccuracies in the measurements of the existing building, which meant that both internal and external adjustments of the prefabricated elements needed to be done at the site. The main barriers to wider adoption of the prefabricated facade systems are that few companies are willing to take total responsibility for the systems and that the systems in their current form are still more expensive than traditional additional insulation and a new facade layer. Actions to be taken in order to overcome these barriers are the further development of products and systems, as well as the change to prefabrication and an assembly on-site system. The systems must become more economically competitive, and the volume of ordered and produced facade elements must increase. Calculation models should be developed that can be used as funding frameworks to demonstrate the advantages of using such prefabricated systems.