Alternative Building Technologies for Sustainable Housing/Building

The Campus Center for Appropriate Technology at Humboldt State University (CAL) has worked on sustainable strategies since 1978.  One "alternative technology" is alternative building techniques, which actually is a wide variety of technologies and materials that help people create buildings with less impact on the environment than traditional wood, concrete and brick.

Many regions of the world (including many parts of the U.S.) do not have enough wood to build wood-frame houses, so forest resources in other regions are depleted in order to import these scarce materials.

While wood-frame houses predominate in the U.S., many other building materials are in use around the world. Houses can be made out of locally available building materials such as cob, adobe, bamboo, straw bales, rammed earth, formed cement, and mixtures of these materials with waste debris (i.e. tires, cans, or bottles).

Inexpensive shelters can be made with poles and canvas, hides, or wool (i.e. Yurt or Teepee). In many places where wood is available, there is an under-utilized supply of "waste" -- small diameter timber (harvested in forest thinning operations). This timber can be used to make pole or log cabin style houses. Thatch, bamboo, tin roofing, sprayed cement, and living roofs can be used as alternatives to plywood/asphalt roofing.

Here are links to the Campus Center for Appropriate Technology's many resources for alternative building options:

• Alternative Building
  • Adobe
  • Bamboo
    • Bamboo Construction at CCAT By John Halley 
      
    • www.DeBoerArchitects.com
  • Cob
    • How to Build With Cob 
      
    • Cob: Technology of the Past, NOW By Patrick McAuley 
      
    • History of Cob By Jeffrey Steuben (Spring 2005)
  • Strawbale
    • CCAT's Strawbale Shed By Lisa Murgatroyd 
      
    • HSU Student Website Strawbale Shed By Tony Frink
      
    • How to Build Straw Bale Buildings [PDF 56.2KB] 
      
  • Rammed Earth
  • Sprayed Concrete and Papercrete
  • Earthships
    • Recycling Tires...More than Just Swings By Desideria Ramirez 
      
  • Yurts
    • Yurt: A Traditional Dwelling as an Alternative Building Design