Steel structure reused for Lenzo

Volantis promotes sustainable use of resources in the construction industry. We will give you an example: the new industrial buildings erected for Belgian company Lenzo in Heusden-Zolder. These are being constructed out of steel rafters obtained from a former industrial building somewhere in the Netherlands.

‘Re-placing’ existing steel structures is not a new activity for the client, Smedts Bedrijfshallen. Every year, Smedts buys many industrial buildings so as to be able to reuse the steel structures incorporated into these industrial buildings to erect new industrial buildings.

At the behest of Smedts Bedrijfshallen, Volantis’ Building & Structures unit performed the calculations needed for the application for a building permit for new industrial buildings to be erected in Heusden-Zolder. Apart from the fact that reusing existing structures is complicated in and of itself, the fact that this structure will be installed at a location outside the Netherlands poses an added challenge. After all, safety factors and climate-related burdens such as snow and wind are different abroad than they are in the Netherlands.

To give you an idea of what is hard about calculating the specifics of an existing structure:

• In many cases, there are no known calculations of the current situation. In such cases, we have no idea whatsoever what the designer intended with regard to things such as stability;
• Standards, guidelines and calculation rules change over the course of time. For instance, in 2010 certain types of loads were not yet taken into account, but in 2013, these had to be included in the calculations. So it may be impossible to install a 2010 structure in the exact same way in, say, 2013.
• As a structural engineer, you are tied to particular types of structural components when designing a new building into which existing structural components are to be incorporated. As a result, you will sometimes have to be creative in coming up with solutions and/or reinforcements. After all, you cannot simply use bigger profiles or use better-quality steel.

With relatively few modifications to the existing structure, the commercial buildings in Heusden-Zolder can be realised.

Some of the adaptations include:

• Adjusting the position and dimensions of the stability bracing;
• A larger number of coupling sleeves in the roof plane.

Because a building’s foundation construction is heavily dependent on its location (and subsoil), reusing a foundation construction is often very difficult. Therefore, these commercial buildings also receive a completely new concrete foundation structure.

Harvesting the existing structure can be a circular and potentially financially attractive option.