Do they exist?
The hunt is on for home-building materials and designs that can withstand the rages and changes brought on by climate change. Once-in-a-hundred-year floods, fires and storms are becoming much more common occurrences, taking lives and wreaking havoc.
Homeowners are rattled and rightly so. Insurance rates are rising, and some insurers are leaving entire communities and even states rather than cover increasing risks. Homeowners, architects and builders are weighing the options and looking for creative materials and designs to ensure greater safety from climate disruptions.
There is light shining through those storm clouds.
An article in the New York Times highlighted the design advantages of the geodesic dome home to resist fire and strong winds. This design has been around for hundreds, maybe thousands of years, used by indigenous people to build dome-shaped dwellings, as an article in Architectural Digest suggests. Only in the last century was the design deemed to be worthy of consideration by engineers and architects for modern construction uses. R. Buckminster Fuller actually patented his design in 1954, showcasing the dome as an option for residential and commercial use.
The idea of dome homes took off a bit in the 1960s but never became a standard choice for home design. The idea of moving from our traditional hard-edged, rectangular designs was a leap too far for most people. Yet today, due to climate change, domes are getting a second look.
One homeowner planned to cover his dome in fire-resistant aluminum shingles that reflect heat. The interior is easier to insulate against cold and hot weather because ,unlike rectangular homes, the dome has less surface area. Another advantage for anyone worried about heavy snowpack or the ability to withstand high winds is that the dome’s surface is better at spreading the stress than traditional designs.
The dome’s design can be a big advantage in areas of the country that are getting hit more frequently with hurricane-force winds. While California has never been hit with a hurricane, and no tropical storm has made landfall in the state, 2023’s Hurricane Hilary brought Southern California its first-ever tropical storm watch. Eventually downgraded to a warning, the storm hammered parts of Southern California with wave action and strong winds.
Throughout the state, aggressive fires have taken their toll on entire communities, so it is natural that people would be seeking safer home designs that can withstand the growing threat of climate change.
Weather-related disasters pushed more than 3.3 million American adults out of their homes in 2022, census data shows. Of those, at least 1.2 million people were out of their homes for a month or longer; more than half a million of them never returned, fueling a growing diaspora of domestic climate refugees.
New York Times, published July 16, 2023, updated July 18, 2023
There is another type of construction that is receiving attention for two outstanding reasons.
A segment of NPR’s Marketplace extolls the virtues of 3D-printed homes, both for their affordability and their disaster-resistant building materials.
According to the broadcast, “3D-printed walls also tend to be stronger, easier to maintain and more resilient against natural disasters …” But, like anything else that is new and different, embracing this technology will take revamping the entire construction industry as we know it today.
If you are looking for creative options to design your dream home for the future, AplosGroup would be happy to discuss the possibilities.