Over the past five years, Eli Gould has been educating architects about the benefits of specifying wood, as one of the nonprofit market development activities of the Quebec Wood Bureau in the US and internationally. With the new trends in timber, course themes have evolved from “why wood” to “how-to,” such as the current one-hour course called: Mastering Timber: How, When, and at What LOD to Introduce Carbon-Fixing Assemblies into Architectural Design.
In his course, Gould elaborates on the benefits of specifying wood, especially its ability to capture carbon. He describes the value of offsite construction in a labor-constrained market. Gould also explains how engineered-wood products can be used in larger and taller buildings, especially with changes to the 2021 IBC that acknowledge the life safety and fire resistance of mass timber with three new categories.
Gould asks the audience of architects and LEED professionals the question “What is the primary obstacle to using more wood structure in your practice?” The majority responded that “the design process doesn’t seem to allow for specifying wood structure.”
Now, thanks to industry collaboration, software innovation, and artificial intelligence, architects have free tools and resources to incorporate wood structure at the early design stage...
