Potentials of Using Bamboo as a Building Material for Permanent Structures in Sri Lanka

Abstract

Most of designers in all over the world thoroughly concerned about sustainable designs. Natural Materials such as wood is mainly considered as sustainable building materials. But now there is a scarcity of wood in Sri Lanka because of over using. Because of these circumstances, some countries try to use Bamboo as a sustainable and renewable building material in building construction. In Sri Lanka Bamboo is only using for temporary Structures as a material even though, Bamboo is fast and easy growing plant in Sri Lankan tropical climate which has an easy access, Bamboo is not a prominent building material in Sri Lanka when building permanent structures. But Bamboo is a good material that using in some other countries in Asia like China, Bali, Nepal and India. In those countries they have techniques for enhance the natural qualities of Bamboo wood as a construction material. So if we can use adopt this techniques to our industry it will be a good solution for our construction industry. If it is possible to adopt those techniques for Sri Lankan context that will be a help to develop the sustainable designs with using Bamboo as a building material. So, this research will be mainly consider about the techniques that they are using for enhancing the natural qualities of bamboo and how we can adopt them to Sri Lankan construction industry. Other than that, the viability of adopting those techniques and using the Bamboo as a building material for permanent structures in Sri Lanka also will be discussed.