Waste from marble quarry used to 3D print architectural elements Professional Additive Manufacturing
According to Digital Building Technologies, researchers at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich (ETH) and the University of Applied Sciences and Arts of Southern Switzerland (SUPSI) have developed a 3D printer designed to transform large quantities of stone waste from quarries into customizable architectural elements. The stone waste, or rock flour, in places like Ticino, can constitute up to 40% of total production. The printer was demonstrated in a case study, where it fabricated an optimized floor system using the byproduct of a marble quarry in Ticino.