The biggest problem with earth building, which I looked in to quite a bit a couple of years ago, seems to be the lack of ventilation and ...

The biggest problem with earth building, which I looked in to quite a bit a couple of years ago, seems to be the lack of ventilation and drainage options relative to other types of building. You still need foundations. Yes, you can make it work. No, it's not always suitable - right tool for the job. Much like other alternate building techniques (straw bale, etc.) it faces significant regulatory challenges in many jurisdictions due to a lack of familiarity with structural properties and the variable nature of the inputs (what type of clay, straw, etc.). Usually it's cost prohibitive to try in cities, because the labour costs are higher. In those situations, prefabbing concrete/other types of slabs and dragging them on site can be a really fast and cheapish way (though environmentally questionable) to get a house up. In general architects and engineers are also far less familiar with the alternate techniques. As for the 'tattoine look' starwars reference, that was actually filmed in the underground houses of Matmata, Tunisia ... which I photographed during the Tunisian revolution for Wikipedia Commons over here - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Matmata_Panorama.jpg

Posted by contingencies on May 18, 2015, 2:52 PM

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