For many years, the construction industry has been known as one of the most wasteful and least sustainable industries; the materials used to construct buildings, the equipment used for demolition and the transportation required of materials to the site, all have a huge carbon footprint. More recently and particularly in South Africa, the construction industry has begun to catch on to the necessity of more sustainable building practices, which has led to the emergence of new and more sustainable building materials. As buyers have become more environmentally conscious and more young people start entering the housing market, the demand for eco-friendly homes and buildings has increased. This has led to the emergence of new types of homes, everything from sandbag houses to houses made of bamboo and straw bales are now completely viable housing alternatives that are far more sustainable than traditional homes.
At 4 Everdeck, we’ve looked into the rising popularity of new eco-friendly building materials in South Africa and how this might change the types of homes people live in in the future. This infographic looks specifically at the new types of building materials that are now available to us and why they are so much more sustainable than brick and mortar.
