In the construction industry, a new climate-tech startup has come up with an idea to address the “rising sea levels” issue caused by global warming and climate change.
Miami-based company Kind Designs has launched a product called Living Seawalls created using 3D concrete printing technology. It’s deemed to be a faster, cheaper and sustainable construction method. The Seawalls created through the 3D printing process will be installed underwater and used to monitor water quality. They are designed to protect shores and enhance and support the biodiversity in the oceans.
According to Anya Freeman, the CEO and founder of Kind Designs, it’s better to seek remedies than dwelling on problems like marine biodiversity decline, coral reefs extinction, rising sea levels and other such environmental challenges faced by cities like Miami.
Freeman started the company to find a solution for the day-to-day problems faced by the city because of deteriorating oceans and they came up with the Living Seawalls idea.
Kind Designs thought of elevating the concept of ordinary Seawalls used to protect land from erosion, floods and storms by using 3D printing to use it to tackle the menace of sea level rise.
3D printing helped create nature-like shapes giving the Seawalls a rough and curvy texture which allows marine life like fish and crustaceans to live in them. This strategy is making the structure more stable and helping marine plants to grow in the seawalls.
The Living Seawalls have embedded sensors equipped with 15 different parameters including pH, salinity, and microbial activity which are used to measure the water quality. With the help of these sensors, Florida counties can collect the data and monitor the conditions in real time instead of relying on manually collected data. Kind Designs also aims to reduce the cost burden of Seawalls by using 3D printing.
3D concrete printing shortened the manufacturing process of Seawalls by two hours. The company used the 3D printing materials from the Dutch construction company CyBe Construction for this purpose. With CyBe’s century-old experience in the construction industry and its latest software, hardware and other additive manufacturing industry-specific solutions, the improved vision of a sustainable society became a reality.
CyBe guided Kind Designs through the process of 3D printing with a three-week intensive training and they started production with seed funding by GOVO Venture Partners, M4 Investing, and the Florida Opportunity Fund where the company raised $5 million for the Living Seawalls project.
Speaking about the matter Anya Freeman said “the funds will be used to speed up production as the company received orders worth $4 million“. Freeman hoped that the funds would help the company “protect all coastal cities with Kind’s Living Seawalls and grow far beyond our home state of Florida”.
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