On May 4, 2020, a two-mile-wide F5 tornado destroyed 95 percent of Greensburg, Kansas, leaving two thirds of the town’s 1,500 inhabitants homeless. Many thought the town was finished. But in fact, the townspeople decided to rebuild using the greenest, most forward-thinking materials and construction methods possible.
Kansas State University professor Larry Bowne’s architecture class responded to the disaster with Greensburg Cubed, a collection of modular 1,000-cubic-foot buildings. The project does double duty by meeting the immediate needs of the community and showcasing green technology, ranging from wind power and solar power to reclaimed construction materials, which will eventually be used to rebuild the rest of the city.
So far, Bowne’s students have shipped four finished cubes to Greensburg, including Ice Cube, a water-delivery and cooling station for residents complete with a rainwater-filtered cooling mister, and Green Haus, a miniature model of environmentally friendly home construction built with straw-bale insulation and glass-bottle windows.
WHAT’S NEXT This fall, a local nonprofit will begin construction on four full-scale demo homes using designs and technologies from Greensburg Cubed.
I bet not a single soul in that town built, or is building, a tornado proof home, an example of which can be found at monolithic.com.
Wow and behold if they ever re-build their homes out of bricks, blocks & mortar. Doesn't the south of America ever learn, or do they just like re-building there homes every 10 years?
Well of course they consider it more important to make it green than tornado proof.
Dustin H
from Montreal, Quebec
Well here's the deal. It's not that they like rebuilding their houses every 10 years, nor is it that they are that "challenged" to understand the whole house vs wind concept.
The reason why people build houses as they are currently, made of wood pannels & drywall, is because thats the way to save more money (both for companies and residents).
For companies, they save money on materials and on work, because they get most of the building pre-made and just assemble the pieces.
For the consumer, its an energy issue. In a brick/cement house, it is very hard to conserve any energy inside the house (either heat or cold) because cement / bricks are not good insulators. That means that during days where its 40C outside, when the walls heat up from the sun, inside will feel like an oven, which in terms requires a lot of cooling down.
- DiGGY
2/3's 1,500 inhabitants homeless... im guessing there is a money issue, and this is why they are building cheap and fast housing with green construction and materials.
"You cant solve a problem using the same thinking that caused the problem" A. Einstein.
Secondly, podboq, your architectural designs found on monolithic.com site features a patented design from someone, who lives in florida and he is 93 years old, just so you dont run into infringement. Finally I would like to add your sphere design is not tornado/hurricane proof. They are stronger than a regular house but not 100% proof. I have the design for that if you are interested then write me a mail and we can discuss further.
Bottom line, great that the US is finally making an effort in building green and solid constructions, its something we in europe have been doing for a century but energy consumption per capita is way too high in the US many countries are WAY ahead so Im hoping for broader learning from other countries. No point in reinventing the wheel if it already exists...
BTW Denmark for example, has 20% coming from windpower and wholly off the grid independent communities living on renewable energy (iin my opinion it should actually be called alternative energy, as oil is renewable , if you wait long enough) Denmark also doubled their GDP since the 1980 without increasing their energy consumption 1% ! so it is proven and I hope others will follow their mentality.
I would be very happy to see the US embracing more communal transporting, stop outsourcing to China, manufacture cars that are safe and running on efficient high pressure engines (like european made cars), waste to energy, windpower on a grand scale, stop ethanol (as it consumes way too much water, which will be the new Black gold-Blue gold) and finally implement biogas for farmers on a grand scale.
from Montreal, Quebec
I still think that they shoud concentrate more on basement-oriente houses. Make th basement out of cement, then put a one-floor house on top. Because the taller the house, the bigger the chance to get blown away.
- DiGGY
I hope they pave a yellow brick road right through the center of town.
Here's an idea for tornado proof, why don't they all live in hobbit holes? That would be very safe.
Dustin H
from Montreal, Quebec
Well they cpuld live in holes, but that would have a huge impact on the health of the people. The human body is used to having sun light around it. Artificial light doesn't always cut it.
It has been proven that the more time one spends under artificial light (compared to a person that spends the same time under a natural light), the more this person is proned to get sick.
- DiGGY