Professor Hamid Valipour
University of New South Wales’ Centre for Infrastructure Engineering and Safety leading construction sustainability researcher Dr Hamid Valipour has been promoted to Professor. Source: Timberbiz
Professor Valipour has long been a man on a mission to reduce the construction industry’s carbon footprint. His work over the last 10 years has focused on the development of innovative structural systems with lower energy and carbon footprints, which are easier to fabricate, assemble and dismantle than those of current practice.
His vision is for the widespread uptake of hybrid structural systems that fully exploit the advantages of steel, concrete and engineered timber to reduce the self-weight, cost and negative environmental impact of current structures, and also enhance opportunities for deconstruction, reusing and upgrading of structures.
Prof Valipour and his CIES colleague Laureate Professor Mark Bradford have already demonstrated the feasibility and superior structural performance of innovative steel-timber systems compared with conventional steel-concrete composite. Prof Valipour has also been busy developing, testing and numerically simulating hybrid/composite timber-concrete and steel-timber connections.
The innovative composite systems developed by Prof Valipour and his research team can be easily dismantled at the end of building service life that will, in turn, significantly facilitate recycling, reusing and/or repurposing of the construction materials and hence reduce construction waste.
He is Chief Investigator on two current ARC Discovery Projects working with eminent CIES colleagues, Professor Mark Bradford for the topic of timber composite floors, and Professor Stephen Foster, Dean of UNSW Engineering, on connections. Both are regarded as global leaders in their respective fields – steel and concrete. Add to that Prof Valipour’s expertise and research passion – timber.
Prof Valipour believes this is where CIES can be an industry leader in research and teaching. He is equally confident that as research and development continue, more buildings and designers will take advantage of innovative hybrid steel-timber-concrete systems.
