From the article: […] […] Also the reporter’s blog post about her process in reporting this story is interesting and has better pictures.
From the article:
[Alaska] sits at the end of a long supply chain mostly disconnected from the road system, which means the cost to barge materials and build is prohibitively expensive, especially for remote and economically distressed areas like Mountain Village. For years, families have crowded into the same dilapidated homes, driving the state’s overcrowding rate to over twice the national average. The homes are inefficient and poorly insulated, burdening families with heating bills sometimes more than 30 percent of their incomes. Without proper mold management and ventilation, respiratory illnesses are endemic in Alaska, especially among Indigenous children. In the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta region, the pneumonia hospitalization rate for infants is tenfold higher than for other infants in the United States.
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It’s not uncommon for two to four families to live in the same three-bedroom house; throughout the village, insulation is rotting, ceilings are separating from walls, and crooked piles support collapsing floors. Residents will use anything to keep their houses from subsiding: ATV drums, concrete slabs, wood cribbing like Jenga blocks. When the floors give way, residents use blankets and sleeping bags to choke off the cold air.
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The CCHRC designed six small prototypes for low-income occupants like Waskey, who used to work in commercial fishing but is now unemployed. The foundation of his 288-square-foot unit will be pre-engineered in a way that, should his finances improve, Waskey could expand the house to 480 square feet, which can be tricky and expensive to do on permafrost.
Then, the CCHRC paired these blueprints with the technology needed for the climate. For the freezing winters, the house is equipped with an insulation-ventilation system that keeps heat in, moisture and dirty air out, and generally uses 70 to 80 percent less fuel use than average homes. The adjustable foundation, normally used for things like temporary bridges, can shift up to nine inches with the vulnerable permafrost underneath Mountain Village. Should the permafrost deteriorate beyond habitation, strong beams can be hooked up to a truck to move the house.
Also the reporter’s blog post about her process in reporting this story is interesting and has better pictures.
From the article:
[…]
[…]
Also the reporter’s blog post about her process in reporting this story is interesting and has better pictures.