BAO LIVING
Circular construction, using materials and products that can be reused several times, is the future. It reduces dramatically construction waste, thus the huge environmental impact of the construction industry.
© Jorik Ossieur, Benjamin Eysermans, Dorien Eeckhout en Axel van der Donk
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SAM. The smart customisable bathroom module
Bao Living is an Antwerp-based start-up active in modular and circular construction. They have developed SAM, an intelligent, customisable module that is affordable and sustainable. It is a circular kit for built-in furniture, including utilities. Ventilation, heating, plumbing and electricity are all included. This complete kit is easy to install and recover. With the support of the city, they can make the bathroom part of this system 100% circular and increase their sales.
A 100% circular bathroom module
The aim of this innovation project was to make the SAM bathroom 100% circular. The SAM bathroom was the only module in the BAO Living system that could not be assembled in a completely circular way, but through this project we made significant progress.
We mapped the ecological impact of the SAM bathroom as accurately as possible using the R ladder and an LCA study. We did a thorough analysis of all the materials in the SAM bathroom and compared them with all sorts of other potentially interesting materials on the market on the basis of price, environmental impact and fit in our SAM concept. From this, we made a trade-off that resulted in a new material composition that scored better on the R ladder, was in line with circular business models and was also cheaper and therefore easier to market.
Some materials have also been eliminated through new concept solutions. Waste is the most circular principle on the R-ladder: using less materials or refusing to use them.
With this study, we can transparently communicate to our end customer the CO2 eq impact of our previous SAM bathroom alongside this new circular variant.
