(Photos from the ReStone Facebook project)
Here is the latest breakthrough in environmental sustainability.
After 10 years of research spearheaded by Associate Professor within the Faculty for the Built Environment, Prof. Spiridione Buhagiar and architect Franco Montesin, the first room made out of recycled limestone building waste has been constructed near Ta’ Qali Crafts Village.
The recycled limestone blocks are made from crushed recycled quarry waste and it is a load bearing product just like the franka stone.
This mix will possibly offer a solution to the challenges faced by the construction industry, as globigerina limestone is becoming an increasingly limited resource and the building industry accounts for the island’s biggest generation of waste.
This is the driving force behind the ReStone project, aiming to commercialise this materialise and make it available locally and even beyond.
A number of tests were, over the past decade, carried out to determine the properties of this new materials, such as its strength, its impact resistance, its water absorption and its most important durability against salt crystallisation.
“The purpose of this room is to see how the recycled stone performs under real-world conditions – it is a work in progress and we hope to improve on the final finish – but we are quite satisfied with the result”, said Prof. Buhagiar in a recent Facebook post.
We’re excited to see more! If you are too, visit the project’s Facebook Page.