For a week now the Summer Olympic Games in Paris have been at the centre of the sporting world's attention, having drawn interest even before the opening ceremony through the sustainable solutions introduced at various stages of organising the Games. One of these is the extensive use of timber in construction.

In total, 95% of the events at these Summer Olympic Games will take place in existing buildings or in venues that will be dismantled after the Games for reuse. However, one permanent sports building was constructed specifically for the Olympic Games – the Paris Olympic Aquatics Centre, which is also the principal architectural symbol of the Summer Olympic Games. Several swimming events have already been held there during the opening days of the Games. Visually striking from the outside and seating 5,000 spectators, the building is essentially a timber structure assembled rather like a set of construction blocks. Speaking to the media about the building work, the contractors highlighted how quickly the timber blocks went together – the timber structures were assembled on site in half the time it had taken to manufacture them.

Record-sized timber beams

One of the features that makes the building unique is its 5,000-square-metre roof, built from glued laminated timber structures. This roof has set a new record in the use of long-span timber structures – each of the beams, 90 metres long, 55 cm deep and 20 cm thick, consists of three 30 m segments. Altogether, the concave roof structure comprises approximately 2,300 m³ of timber. Contrary to the objections of sceptics that timber is not the strongest material when compared with steel, for example, it is worth noting that timber is far more flexible and able to adapt to deformation. It has been calculated that all the timber structural elements inside the centre are capable of bearing loads of up to 800 tonnes. Between 30 and 40% of the timber used in building the aquatics centre was sourced in France, mainly Douglas fir and spruce. What is more, 95% of the timber used in the construction of the sports centre is PEFC certified, confirming that it comes from sustainably managed forests.

There are also notable examples of timber use in other competition venues. One is the Grand Palais Éphémère. This building previously served as a temporary gallery for the main Paris exhibition hall while the latter was being renovated, but during the Olympic Games it will host judo, wrestling, wheelchair rugby and Paralympic judo competitions. The 10,000-square-metre hall is formed by 44 timber arches, preserving the spaciousness and unity of the space. In addition, the insulating properties of the timber used in the building reduce energy consumption.

Timber has also been used in the construction of the Olympic village buildings, among many other environmentally friendly and sustainable solutions. There, buildings of up to eight storeys have been built from solid timber and glass, with all the energy they need obtained sustainably through heat pumps and renewable energy sources.

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Both the goal of mitigating climate change and the desire to make responsible use of environmentally friendly, renewable materials have encouraged wider use of timber in construction elsewhere in Europe too. In Finland it is forecast that within the next five years timber construction will become the leading form of building.

Long-span timber structures – at the LVM tree nursery too

Timber has also been used extensively in the latest buildings of JSC "Latvijas valsts meži" (LVM), contributing to the reduction of climate change and of the GHG emissions generated by the construction sector. In 2023, during the construction of the production section of the seedling sorting and processing complex at the LVM Mežvidi tree nursery, long-span glued laminated timber structures reaching 30 metres in length were installed.

At the end of the winter of 2024, a topping-out ceremony was held for the future LVM Rietumvidzeme region customer centre building, the third structure to be built under the standard LVM customer centre design. The Zemgale region customer centre, opened in 2021, was likewise built using timber both in its structures and in its interior, combining a modern, comfortable design with a demonstration of the advantages of timber as an innovative and environmentally friendly building material.

The growing use of timber in construction in Latvia is also borne out by a number of public buildings in whose construction or renovation timber has been used, for example, Ogre Library, the open-air concert hall "Mītava", the road bridges in Jaunpils and Ječupe, the open-air stages in Penkule and Krimūnas, the renovated building of the Riga Circus and other structures. House building, too, has strong traditions of timber use, which guarantees stable and growing demand for timber in this field in the future.