Abstract

As the operation of buildings become more efficient, the carbon emissions generated by other phases of the building's life cycle should also be mitigated to fully address the climatic crisis. In this sense, structural systems have an important role in the total embedded carbon of a construction. This paper proposes a workflow to inform the conceptual design development of truss structures with data about material quantity and embedded carbon. For this, a multi-objective optimization process enables the integration of different criteria such as structural performance, shape complexity, utilization ratio and design rationalization. The procedure is implemented in Rhino/Grasshopper, using a parametric model that can be adjusted by the designer, according to the project requirements. The workflow is applied to a study case of a sports hall located in Chile. The results show that the mass and embedded carbon can be decreased by over 60%. It also allows assessing different rationalization levels of the design, to maintain a reduction of these variables, while enabling a more suitable truss for construction.