Really, there was not much debate on the first ever tall building to supposedly collapse from fire? If Bazant thought the collapse of the Twins was surprising, WTC 7 ought to have given him a heart attack.
You do have a bad habit of taking quotations out of context.
Remember that Bazant was speaking as a professional with other professionals and honest lay-persons as his target. He holds Conspiracy Theorists in disdain - read his papers. It would be unthinkable for him to even consider CTs worthy of intelligent comment.
The Twin Towers both survived a massive trauma from aircraft impacts. And remained standing for about one hour before the unfought fires caused collapse. So the professionals knew that the towers withstood the impact. Most would have, in that hour, been wondering about the extent of fire. And expecting survival - remember the scale of fire was not fully obvious.
I never had that hour of professional doubt. I first saw the event on "breaking news" (BBC TV in Wales - I was on a tour.) So my first knowledge was based on two video "grabs" - plane impact and collapse. I never knew of the one-hour delay. So it was obvious "plane impact causes collapse". I never gave it another thought for 6 years till I first heard of the nonsense and stupidity of claims for CD from a work colleague who I had not been aware was a Conspiracy Theorist. Tho I had experienced many dealings with CTs in my professional career - public health engineering - so the CTs I experienced were health faddists. The same sort of characters who make up anti-vax and COVID CT claims.
THEN - again you take this comment also ignoring context:
WTC 7 ought to have given him a heart attack.
Why? It was 7 hours later. After fire had caused the collapse of both Twin Towers. And WTC7 was ravaged by unfought fires. And, even if he had earlier had any doubt, he now knew with certainty that fires could cause collapse.
Remember also he is a respected Professor of Engineering. Structural engineering. And, like every such engineer who is competent, he is well aware of the vulnerability of steel-framed high rises to heat weakening from fires. Fire resistance is a major factor in designing steel framed high rises.
Put bluntly he, like me, is one of the last who is likely to either be as ignorant or be impressed by the lies of conspiracy theorist claiming CD. And it only took him 2 days to put out the first professional assessment - that paper co-authored with Zhou "Why Did the World Trade Center Collapse?—Simple Analysis".
.