Biodesign as a Tool to Achieve Sustainable Construction Through Additive Manufacturing

Currently, cities face the challenges of achieving net-zero emissions, sustainable resource usage, and occupational safety. Sustainable manufacturing processes (SMP) in the architecture, engineering, and construction industry (AEC) could help to master such challenges if non-digitized or insufficiently networked processes did not repeatedly hinder it. The smart combination of additive manufacturing (AM) and nature-based design (NbD) could lead to an economic breakthrough in SMP. AM quickens process fulfillment and automation, offering potential to reduce expenditures in resources, costs, and associated risks while ensuring sustainability, and if early integrated into the design, it allows defining lightweight, sustainable, and material as objectives. NbD approaches in AM for AEC lead to complex structures with superior performance, minimizing material usage, and fostering regenerative, inclusive, and climate-adapted designs that shape contemporary architecture. Thus, this chapter comprehensively reviews NbD for AM projects, analyzing (i) geometry-focused design strategies, (ii) modeling approaches with performance criteria, and (iii) challenges of implementing NbD approaches in AEC.