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https://www.cnbc.com/2022/09/27/amphibious-houses-oceanixs-floating-city-adapt-to-sea-level-rise.html>
"Florida is bracing for Hurricane Ian. Hurricane Fiona has just devastated
Puerto Rico, flooding the island leaving hundreds of thousands without access
to electricity or running water. Meanwhile, flooding in Pakistan has taken over
1,600 lives.
To combat the some of the worst impacts of flooding, a new industry of floating
infrastructure is emerging. There are two distinct approaches that are being
put forth as possible solutions: retrofitting homes to be amphibious and
building floating city blocks.
Amphibious homes can preserve the accessibility of the house and maintain the
congenial front porch culture in places like Louisiana, said Elizabeth English,
founder and director of The Buoyant Foundation Project and professor of
architecture at the University of Waterloo in Canada.
English’s design places a steel frame beneath a house, and then below that, in
the crawl space, buoyancy elements. Her team then recommends adding elements to
prevent lateral movement so the home will not float away while on the surface
of floodwaters. She said this works best in shotgun-style homes without
basements, and because all modifications are made below the first floor, the
rest of the house can remain unchanged. She estimated that a contractor could
do such a retrofit for about $20 to $30 per square foot, but cautioned the
Federal Emergency Management Agency currently discourages this type of building
practice.
In the long run, English cautioned that “retrofits in general are not a good
way to make money because each one is individual and has to be custom designed.
And so that’s very expensive.” She does, however, hope that her design could
help preserve culture and give communities one option to help as they decide
how they want to adapt to rising sea levels."
Via Frederick Wilson II.
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
