Holcim (US) Inc. Announces 3rd International Holcim Awards Competition Open

WALTHAM, Mass., July 1 /PRNewswire/ -- The 3rd International Holcim Awards competition offering a total of $2 million in prize money is open to: sustainable building and civil engineering works; landscape, urban design and infrastructure projects; and materials, products and construction technologies. The Awards are an initiative of the Swiss-based Holcim Foundation for Sustainable Construction.

Entries must be submitted online at www.holcimawards.org by March 23, 2011. The competition celebrates innovative, future-oriented and tangible projects and visions from around the globe and is open to anyone involved with approaches that contribute towards a more sustainable built environment. The 3rd International Holcim Awards competition is comprised of five regional competitions in 2010/11 and the global phase in 2012. Step-by-step instructions on how to enter the competition are available at: www.holcimawards.org/guides

Holcim Awards (main) and "Next Generation" (student) categories

The main category of the competition is open to architects, planners, engineers, project owners, builders and construction firms that showcase sustainable responses to technological, environmental, socioeconomic and cultural issues with contemporary building and construction. Projects are eligible for the competition if they have reached an advanced stage of design. Construction (or commercial production in the case of materials, products and construction technologies) must not have started before July 1, 2010. In addition, the Holcim Awards seeks visions and ideas for the "Next Generation" category, open to student projects created within university programs at final year bachelor level or above (including master's and PhD).

Measuring up to "target issues" for sustainable construction

Submissions in both categories are evaluated by independent juries, using five "target issues" to define sustainable construction. Three of these align with the triple bottom line concept of balanced social, environmental and economic performance. The rest cover contextual and aesthetic impact, and innovation and transferability. For further details see: www.holcimawards.org/target

Internationally renowned architects and academics in juries

The juries in the five competition regions include experts in sustainable construction, such as Angelo Bucci (Brazil), Raymond J. Cole (Canada), Wowo Ding (China), Harry Gugger (Switzerland), Bjarke Ingels (Denmark), Sheila Kennedy (USA), Ashok B. Lall (India), Winy Maas (Netherlands), Jurgen Mayer H. (Germany), Mohsen Mostafavi (USA), Amer Moustafa (UAE), Lucy Musgrave (UK), Olivia la O'Castillo (Philippines), Joe Osae-Addo (Ghana), Michel Rojkind (Brazil), Hashim Sarkis (Lebanon), Bruno Stagno (Costa Rica), Gunawan Tjahjono (Indonesia). A full list of jury members is available at: www.holcimawards.org/jury

Support by world-renowned technical universities  

The Holcim Awards competitions are conducted in partnership with some of the world's leading technical universities. The Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH Zurich) leads the Technical Competence Center of the Holcim Foundation. Other partner universities which host the independent competition juries are: the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge, USA; the Universidad Iberoamericana (UIA) in Mexico City, Mexico; l'Ecole Superieure d'Architecture de Casablanca (EAC) in Morocco; and Tongji University (TJU) in Shanghai, China. The Universidade de Sao Paulo (USP), Brazil, and the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) in Johannesburg, South Africa, are associated universities of the Holcim Foundation.

About Holcim (US) Inc.

Holcim (US) Inc. is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Holcim Ltd, and one of the nation's leading manufacturers and suppliers of cement and mineral components. Holcim (US) Inc. has approximately 2,000 employees and operates 13 manufacturing plants and over 70 distribution facilities in the United States.

About The Holcim Foundation

The Holcim Foundation is supported by Holcim Ltd and its Group companies in around 70 countries and is independent of its commercial interests. Holcim is one of the world's leading suppliers of cement and aggregates as well as further activities such as ready-mix concrete and asphalt including services. In 2009 the Group was confirmed as a member of the Dow Jones Sustainability Index for the seventh time in succession.

SOURCE Holcim (US) Inc.