IMPROVING RESILIENCE OF EARTH CONSTRUCTION – CURRENT PERSPECTIVES AND FUTURE OUTLOOK

Earth has been, for thousands of years, the main source of construction materials and, as of today, roughly one-third of the world’s population still lives in earth buildings. With increasing concerns about our environmental footprint, this ancient technique has regained interest. Whereas before, the focus was on studying the techniques with the main goal of preserving building’s heritage, more recently, the focus shifted to the development of new and innovative solutions to reintroduce this technique as a viable alternative to cement and concrete.
The use of adobe bricks as a sustainable and affordable alternative for construction has many advantages, however, poses nonetheless, some challenges. The major threats to this type of building are heavy rainfall, flooding and earthquakes. Finding a solution that can make adobe bricks more resilient to heavy rain and flooding – while keeping it low cost and based on local sources – is at the basis of this work. To reach this goal, several types of natural fibres have been used as an alternative to traditional straw. The results show that some of these fibres can improve the bricks’ mechanical strength, allowing the structures to resist adverse weather conditions.
From this research, it also became apparent that the low quality of many of these adobe blocks is related with the inconsistency in the preparation methods. There is clearly a need to provide local communities with guidelines and procedures that allow for higher quality standards. In this paper, it will be presented a new strategy to improve and standardise the fabrication of these bricks, overcoming the lack of quality often associated with these traditional products.