CLIMATE resilient housing could play a crucial role in achieving net zero goals and addressing homelessness on a global scale.
Dr Nandan Mukherjee designed the homes alongside researchers at Dundee University. They can withstand floods, cyclones, and earthquakes, and also generate their own electricity and food sources.
A small number have already been built in flood-prone areas of Bangladesh. Their significantly low material and construction cost, just £7,000, makes them perfect for global construction.
The low cost is achieved using newly created bricks designed by the researchers, they are three times stronger than sandstone and can be adapted to use local material.
This then means that exportation and emission costs for materials are eliminated contributing to Net Zero and helping to tackle climate change.
Speaking about the homes, Dr Mukherjee said: “These homes are built to a Net Zero standard.
“Construction of the houses achieves Net Zero, and when used as intended, they are carbon-negative.
“One-third of greenhouse gas emissions into the atmosphere come from the construction sector, so the University of Dundee’s climate-resistant home addresses that problem.
“We need to see a lot more support globally to expand projects like this for a much wider good and to address the crisis before us.”
The homes were mentioned after Dr Mukherjee stated that global climate change requires “less talk and more action”.
He said about climate change: “We have been negotiating for 30 years now, but the reality is that the root cause of climate change – greenhouse gas concentration in the atmosphere – is not going down; it’s going up.
“In 1992 – three years before COP was established – the concentration of carbon dioxide in the air was 352 ppm [parts per million]. Now it is 422 ppm.
“It’s going up every year. We want reasonable actions for that.”
The primary purpose of the COP, or the Conference of the Parties, is for its 197 member countries and the EU to negotiate how to approach climate change-related issues and assess progress on them.
This includes progress in working towards the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which were adopted by all United Nations Member States in 2015 and aim to end poverty and other deprivations while tackling climate change.
Dr Mukherjee continued: “Many countries speak positively about achieving their SDGs by 2030, but the reality is very different.
“Homelessness is increasing, water scarcity is increasing, energy security is decreasing, food security is decreasing – none of these are positive.
“Despite the policies created over the years, we are not seeing many solutions. What I want from this COP is solutions. We have said enough.”
He also explained his expectations from this event, which include establishing a new finance goal, operationalising the loss and damage finance mechanism, and enhancing commitment to Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs).
Other expectations include a global goal on adaptation, green taxonomy in new sustainable finance goals, and a specific timeline for the phasing out fossil fuels.
