Emergency housing

[J & D Goldman]

Thanks for the info on the BFI and related work, I'll take a look at
that.

I had several interesting messages in response to my posting, but they
all came directly to me. If any of you would care to forward the
message you sent me to the dome list, I'm sure others on the list
would be as interested in your comments as I.   You each have a
perspective on this issue that would be valuable to share with the
group.

- Dan G.

-----Original Message-----
From: Spencer W Hunter <shunter at u.arizona.edu>
To: domesteading at sculptors.com <domesteading at sculptors.com>
Date: Wednesday, October 12, 2005 1:40 PM
Subject: Re: Emergency housing


>On Tue, 11 Oct 2005, J & D Goldman wrote:
>
>> So the climatologists are telling us we've had 50 years of unusally
good
>> global weather and that things are really going back to "normal".
Their
>> point is, don't expect the frequency of storms and earthquakes to
let
>> up, we had our rest from them, and now its over.
>>
>> So, along with that, the need for emergency housing has never been
>> greater. FEMA buys how many millions of dollars worth of trailers?
>> Certainly an advantage having built-in utilities in a ready to
live-in
>> format, but in some cases, people would be happy to just get under
>> cover.  I think those people in Pakistan, in the cold rain, would
be
>> delighted to have one.
>
>The trailer decision should be the last straw for the incompetency of
>FEMA.  RVs have very limited utilities on their own and need to be
hooked
>up to external water and electricity, and those chemical toilets will
be
>needing attention.  Meanwhile, a viable solution was staring them in
the
>face the entire time.
>
>> One wonders what it will take to get domes to a point where they
are
>> available and actually used.  I just placed an order for some
samples
>> of plastic greenhouse pots made from PLA, essentially corn starch,
and
>> have been visiting with some others about soybean resins used for
>> insulation and foamboard perfectly suitable for structures. When
you
>> look at what is being done with honeycomb panels now, I think I can
>> see how this could really come together.
>
>*knock on wood!*
>
>> I know some people are working on at least some emergency housing
demo
>> projects to give domes  enough exposure to start the ball rolling.
>> Anybody see anything happening in domes for emergency housing?  No
>> lack of need....
>>
>>  Dan G.
>
>Check out the cover news story at http://www.bfi.org/ .  The
Buckminster
>Fuller Intstitute Emergency Shelter Special Projects Committee is
working
>with World Shelters ( http://www.worldshelters.org/ , partly run by
the
>folks who brought us North Face tents) to develop the kind of truly
>autonomous dwellings the victims of these disasters are literally
begging
>for.  So, there is some hope.
>
>Spencer Hunter, Tucson, AZ
>gopher://www.u.arizona.edu:80/hGET%20/%7Eshunter