Monday, April 16, 2012

Flat-pack Townhouses and Apartments for Energy Efficient Affordable Housing

Flat-pack furniture company also sells prefabricated homes. Ikea is building "Strand East" with 1,200 new homes on 10.5 hectare site in London, between Stratford High Street, Three Mills Wall River and the River Lea (see "IKEA breaks ground on its Utopian village within London", By Eric Mack, 11:08 April 13, 2012). Ikea developed the Boklok building process with a Swedish building company. While this emphasizes wooden construction (like the flat-pack furniture) of freestanding houses, townhoueses and walk-up flats housing, the London development incorporates high rise and so will not be using that system entirely. What is still applicable is Ikea's approach to maximum use of space and minimum use of materials through design, with modular components allowing a custom result using mass produced standard components.

Media reports indicate that the victorian government may scrap requirements for 6-star thermal efficiency on new homes and renovations. A useful compramise might be to lower the efficiency requirements for renovations, but retain them for new built homes. At the same time the regulations on demolition of old buildings could be relaxed. In many cases it will be cheaper, quicker and more environmentally efficient to demolish a building and replace it with an energy efficient new one, than try to retrofit an old building. The materials of the old building can be recycled and the components for a new prefabricated one assembled in a factory, then shipped to the site and erected quickly.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

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