With back-to-back monsoon calamities leaving a trail of death and destruction, Kerala is finding itself at the receiving end of nature’s fury. Besides rendering lakhs homeless, the floods and landslides have destroyed crops over vast tracts of land and public infrastructure like roads and bridges. While many areas suffered total inundation for days together, many others vanished within no time, buried under tonnes of mud.
The alarming frequency of such events has turned the focus on destruction of forests, hills and wetlands in the name of development and raised questions over the viability of building houses and engaging in agriculture in disaster-prone areas. In this situation, learning to live without tampering with the nature much, employing environment-friendly building methods and practising sustainable farming are the way to go. We tell you how.
Resilient homes
Various analyses have to be carried out while constructing a building in a particular area. Such as:
Land suitability analysis
Land Suitability Analysis (LSA) is a GIS-based process to determinethe suitability of a specific area for considered use. It reveals the suitability of an area regarding its intrinsic characteristics (suitable or unsuitable). Also, this analysis involves a wide range of criteria, including environmental, social and economic factors.
Slope stability analysis
The analysis is performed to assess the safe design of manmade or natural slopes (eg embankments, road cuts, open-pit mining, excavations and landfills) and the equilibrium conditions. The main objectives of slope stability analysis are finding endangered areas, investigation of potential failure mechanisms, determination of the slope sensitivity to different triggering mechanisms, designing of optimal slopes concerning safety, reliability and economics of designing possible remedial measures.
Soil analysis
It helps conclude as to what type of foundation is to be constructed based on the properties of the soil type found in that particular area.
How to reduce carbon footprint in buildings
Walls: Must do cavity wall insulation, internal or external insulation, and cladding of external and internal surfaces
Roofs: Proper insulation and ventilation systems needed
Windows: Installation of double or triple glazing, draught glazing, draught-proofing windows
Floors: Installation of insulation
Lighting: New controls, occupancy sensors, LED lightings and other low-energy technologies
Renewable energy system: Installation of photovoltaics, solar thermal heating, passive solar heating, wind energy, wood and organic waste power-sourced heating or power plant and micro-hydro power to reduce energy consumption
Water conservation: Installation of low-flow water fittings. Avoid shower heads and dual flush toilets. Rainwater harvesting to be given priority.
Electricity: Reduce consumption of power during peak hours. Go for onsite power generation, including energy from solar panels
Construction in marshy lands
In marshy places like Kuttanad, it is always better to use light-weight building materials like prefabricated walls made of cement panels and fly-ash filler and aerated cement blocks. For roof, instead of concrete, a multi-layered pattern using terracotta tiles, thermocol, thin steel sheets and a mesh layer can be used.
How best to construct