33 Forum MAKING HOUSES LIKE AIRCRAFT
Offsite construction has to be extremely important for the future of housing. The days of wet construction must be numbered. Offsite construction, such as SkaniaHus and other upmarket Continental companies prove, is the only way to control, manufacture and erect the very best and most efficient housing units. Clearly, it is necessary to think outside the box.
Housing Forum has also looked at how other people do it and how much we can learn from them. For example, there are the Hideto Horike’s concepts using steel in Japan. This is steel architecture for housing to produce a new environment. The architects have produced spaces without columns or obvious structure and interior walls without finishes, all of which mean that the occupants can adopt their own lifestyle. This concept, it is claimed, is the geo-environment way to live.
The structure is make of thin steel – double-skinned insulated using a flexible chemical jointing system which eliminates onsite welding and highly skilled technology. The transportable sized units, 3m x 8mx 3,2m which can be transported by truck, provide energy saving in building erection and shorter construction time. The concept brings together building service systems which address all the current environmental demands and maximize natural energies – solar energy, rainwater, wind, air, geothermal energy, underground water are all proposed. Briefly:
Forum Questions:
What are we to make of IKEA’s initiative to build prefabricated housing on nationwide sites?
Is prefabrication the only way forward for housing?
Do you have anything to say about this? Email:
housing@tspltd.co.uk
Wind power generation Dedicated windmills for each dwelling unit providing approximately 20% of the electricity needed.
Rainwater utilisation Collected on the roof and stored in the basement for toilet, maintenance and plant irrigation to save demand on the portable water supply.
Natural ventilation Uses natural uplift within the cavity, in this case due to altitude difference, using bottom and top grilles. Required when the external skin is subject to high solar gain to reduce heat gain in summer and free ventilation (aircon) without mechanical or electrical power.
Air-to-air heat exchange This is a waste heat recovery system using exhaust air to preheat or precool incoming air.
Geothermal heat pump system This uses geothermal energy as a heat source in winter and a coolant in summer. It comprises 9mm diameter linked polyethylene tubes installed in the steel piles with a water source heat pump.
Air source/sink heat pump aircon system This optional system has an output energy of more than 4.5 times that of the input energy and is based on pre-insulated refrigerant tubes within the wall cavity.
Evaporative cooling system Another optional system used to reduce inner heat by used the stored rainwater in the basement to spraying atomized water over the inner panel to make them slightly wet. When air travels within the wall cavity, evaporation tales place and reduces the surface temperature.
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