The construction industry is facing a fundamental transformation. By 2050, an additional 2.5 billion people worldwide will be living in cities. At the same time, the housing crisis, climate pressures, and material shortages are intensifying: Steel and concrete are CO₂-intensive, wood is becoming scarcer — for example, due to spruce die-off in Europe — and mass-production construction methods are reaching their limits.
The demand for housing, infrastructure, and energy facilities continues to grow, while requirements for sustainability, resource efficiency, and industrial scalability are rising. Traditional building materials are increasingly reaching their ecological and economic limits.
TURBOO® is pursuing a new approach: the development of a high-performance structural building material based on a rapidly renewable raw material. Using modern processing technology, giant bamboo is transformed into a high-performance, industrially viable material for the construction industry of the future.
The Problem
The construction industry is one of the world’s largest consumers of resources and emitters of CO₂ — dominated by steel, concrete, and energy-intensive materials.
At the same time, demand is growing massively: by mid-century, billions more people will be living in cities. Housing, infrastructure, and energy facilities must be built faster and more efficiently than ever before.
Wood is also coming under pressure. In Europe, it is becoming increasingly clear that spruce — the primary raw material for load-bearing wooden components — cannot withstand global warming: stands are dying off or losing significant quality.
The consequence: The industry needs new material solutions. In particular, the hybrid combination of wood with rapidly renewable high-performance raw materials such as bamboo opens up enormous potential for scalable, sustainable construction.
New Material Solutions
The transformation of the construction industry requires new categories of materials. In the future, building materials must meet several requirements simultaneously: high load-bearing capacity, low weight, industrial manufacturability, and a significantly better carbon footprint.
Bio-based materials are gaining importance in this context. They utilize renewable raw materials, sequester CO₂, and open up new possibilities for sustainable construction methods — provided they also meet the structural requirements of modern buildings.
This is exactly where TURBOO® comes in: It enables highly efficient lightweight construction — lighter than steel, with significantly slimmer wall and ceiling structures. This results in more usable space, lower dead weights, and new design freedoms.
The result: more economical, taller, and multi-story buildings. In an era of growing cities and necessary densification, this is precisely the decisive lever for the construction methods of the future.
The Solution: TURBOO®
TURBOO® is a high-performance structural building material based on giant bamboo. The material combines the mechanical properties of modern high-performance materials with the sustainability of a rapidly renewable raw material.
Giant bamboo is among the most resilient plants on Earth. Its fiber-based structure ensures high tensile and flexural strength while maintaining a low weight. Using a specially developed processing technology — including precise bonding, industrial pressing processes, and finger-jointing for long lengths — standard-compliant, load-bearing components are created.
A key advantage lies in its system compatibility: TURBOO® can be used as a standalone material or combined in a hybrid form with wood and carbon fibers.
This results in performance-optimized components and construction systems for building construction, infrastructure, and modular construction methods.
TURBOO® thus opens up a new category of materials for the construction industry — for high-performance, resource-efficient structures and a globally scalable, sustainable construction approach.
Would you like to learn more about TURBOO®, initiate a collaboration, or discuss a specific project? Talk to us.
Our Partner Network
The development of TURBOO® is supported by an international network of research, industry, and the construction sector. Together, we are working to establish a new building material standard for a sustainable construction industry.
Validatoren und Partner
