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All around us, technology is being used to disrupt markets that have existed for decades – in some cases centuries.
It’s top of mind for me, because I am in the market for a home.
The idea of being able to download and print a livable structure may seem outlandish to some, but that’s what a few companies across the world are indeed doing.
The home was built in the Russian town of Stupino in the middle of winter.
The home was built using Icon’s proprietary machine Vulcan, a 3D printer which uses a concrete mix that hardens as it dries.
Icon says it can currently create a single-storey house in 48 hours at a cost of less than $10 000.
The company believes that by the time it has Vulcan in full production, it will have halved the time and cost to produce a house.
As I browsed through image after image of the rectangular Icon 3D printed home in Austin, I was astounded that a house which looked that good had been built in just two days.
Are these the homes of our not-too-distant future?
Considering how expensive buying a home can be and how many people around the world still suffer the indignity of being homeless, are we perhaps looking at the early stages of a technology that could help solve the world’s housing crisis?
For the past year Icon has been collaborating with San Francisco-based non-profit New Story to perfect a speedy, low-cost way to build houses using 3D printing.
New Story has been building low-cost houses in
El Salvador for a few years. With current methods it can build 100 homes in eight months with a unit cost of $6?000.
Thanks to the collaboration with Icon, New Story says it can now construct 100 3D-printed homes in just over three months at a unit cost of $4 000 per structure.
Alexandria Lafci, New Story’s co-founder and chief operating officer, told Wired magazine that the tech is ready now to print “very high-quality, safe homes”.
New Story plans to get the Vulcan to El Salvador later this year in order to build the first community of 3D-printed homes.
A basic home at $4 000 equates to just over R49 000 at the current exchange rate. The $10 000 version erected in Austin equates to R122 600.
Considering that prices are only going to come down the more 3D-printed homes are adopted globally, it’s clear that the construction industry is facing a new technology that it simply can’t ignore.
How it responds will determine its future. Hopefully it doesn’t stick its head in the sand until it’s too late, like other industries have done before it.
Sure, 3D-printed homes have a long way to go before they are widely adopted, but the early achievements of this embryonic technology are impressive.
Perhaps one day South Africans will be moving into freshly printed homes.
Judging from the stories I have heard from friends who recently renovated their homes the traditional way, the thought of a one- or two-day build period is very appealing indeed.
