From Guest-Blogger Penny McCracken: Chinese Construction – Unbelievable
This is incredible. I had to view it twice. It’s another reason why we have to focus on China as a country that is soaring ahead of us in so many areas. This 30-story hotel took 15 days to build!
Notice each of the sections already has electric and water pipes installed and were tested for accuracy all prior to them leaving the factory. It appears like those “sections” formed and pretested at the factory, snug together like Lego building blocks. And look at the earthquake resistance level.
Thanks, Penny. It most certainly is incredible how the Chinese have zoomed past the U.S. in terms of technology, enabled by a number of factors – some praiseworthy, others not. In any case, it’s up to us to work hard to develop the cutting-edge technologies in the chief disciplines that will be important to world leadership in the 21st Century. Needless to say, clean energy is key among these arenas.
Amazing as this is, the same company are just starting on a building 220 floors high called Sky City which is due to be completed in 90 days. This building will be the tallest tower block in the world when completed.
If they go on like this they will have to start thinking about pressurising the upper floors!
http://gizmodo.com/5962070/china-will-build-the-tallest-building-in-the-world-in-just-90-days
If they’ve actually built a high-quality 30 story hotel in only 15 days, good for them! However, it’s a bit too soon to come to any conclusions unless there is more information available. Chinese quality tends to be highly variable, from junk to high quality, and our knowledge of this building is limited. It’s something that we should be looking into since it may be that we should be improving construction methods.
Stating that it was built on only 15 days is somewhat misleading since that excludes the time building the prefabricated components in a factory. It would be more accurate to say that the on-site assembly took only 15 days. Even so, components can be built faster and to higher standards in a factory than they can be built on-site.
The economics of the 220 floor building they are starting are questionable. As a building increases in height, the percentage of floor space devoted to elevators increases greatly thereby reducing the percentage of usable space available. It also takes more time to get to the upper floors. Plumbing becomes more complicated because of the hydrostatic pressure resulting from the height. So, it’s unclear whether the 220 floor building would be constructed for good business reasons or whether it’s to enhance the prestige of China.
Well, as far as factory vs onsite, I would want to see the factory. Ask any insurance assessor or property tax assessor which house is rated higher and they will invariably say a site built vs manufactured home. I’ve lived in a few now and I will say that site built houses tend to be sturdier and better constructed. Theoretically a modular built building will be better constructed if all of the glues and paints have time to adhere before sending it out to the elements but as a practical matter . . . let’s look at the building in 5 years.
For the other issue of elevators there isn’t any more space requirement for elevators on a “per floor” basis for a 220 floor building than there is on a 22 floor building. As for the water pressure requirements, that is what they make booster pumps for.
There is also this
http://journal.probeinternational.org/2012/12/12/press-release-80000-deaths-from-2008-chinese-earthquake-was-likely-not-an-act-of-god-says-new-study/
China can turn its attention to re-treeing and re-planting land, to improve hydrological cycles. It might be that this would be a better priority.