Since the introduction of its glassfibre reinforced concrete facade products in 2004, Rieder has continuously expanded its products: The range includes thin large-size panels, narrow slats and three-dimensional shaped elements. The greatest driving force behind the continuous development efforts is the striving to create more than just sustainable concrete facades to allow the company to make an active contribution to the energy revolution.
With the goal of safeguarding the future of the company and to make life better for future generations, the facade specialist Rieder takes comprehensive steps to accelerate the greening of the company. This is achieved, among other things, through new material combinations, the radical reduction of waste and the extension of the life cycle of products. With a catalogue of measures and a concrete roadmap, the company is working on producing and operating with a CO2-positive balance by 2030. “We have identified the levers where we can intervene. Now we are implementing our plan, evaluating the results and developing them further,” says Wolfgang Rieder, summarising the timetable of his company’s journey towards climate neutrality. To do this, the facade specialist relies on a zero-waste strategy: in addition to developing a CO2-reduced concrete matrix and the planting of trees to bind CO2, a new product has also been introduced.
pixel – transformation from waste to design
Rieder has launched a project to reduce waste in the production of facade elements made of glassfibre reinforced concrete and to further pursue its zero-waste strategy. A waste analysis was used over the period of more than one year to determine what percentage of the material was suitable for reuse. Over 106,000 parts were read in, areas, boundaries, shapes, colours and textures were decoded and then classed by size and shape. The potential shapes were used to develop the pixel product, a small-format concrete shingle measuring 147 x 240 millimetres. The format was determined according to the rules of the golden section, in order to give the division ratio of the two sizes a harmonious appearance.
Due to their small size, the elements open up entirely new design options for innovative building envelopes. This means that materials made of mineral raw materials not only offer recycling options, but also upcycling options in the form of small shingles.
