SA Affordable Housing November - December 2018 // Issue: 73 | Page 21

FEATURES
“The stilts are made out of durable plastic too, to ensure that
they cannot be damaged by the elements, or eaten by
insects,” he says, before adding that these buildings have
already received approval from Agrément and are, as such,
perfectly certified and ‘fit for purpose’.
On the other end of the affordable housing scale are the
Umnyama Ikhaya, which are ‘green sustainable modular
houses’. The company boasts that these shipping container
based homes are entirely capable of sustaining completely
off-the-grid living ‘on the condition that you approach this
lifestyle with a conservative angle of no wastage or excess
usage’.
At almost three times the price of the RWPA stilt homes,
Umnyama iKhaya’s real benefit comes from the cost savings
to the owner over the life time of living in the home. If the
owner is careful and truly capable of living off the grid then
the only cost following initial set up is in maintaining the
building with massive savings on electricity, water and
effluent removal. The Umnyama iKhaya come fully equipped
with all the necessary ‘green devices’ including a 5 000ℓ
rainwater tank, which is filled from the ‘rainwater harvesting
roof’, a solar pressure pump, a waterless extracting
dehydration toilet, which we are assured is odourless, four
solar panels and even a vertical farming façade, which would
allow the owner to grow veggies, herbs or flowers.
These are just two of the innovative solutions offered
locally that take careful cognisance of the environment, as
well as provide shelter.
Apart from the obvious green credentials of these two
house types, pod homes offer additional assistance to the
environment in a number of other more subtle ways. Firstly
pod homes tend to create less waste than a traditional
building. It’s easier to gauge how much material is required
for a prebuilt home since the same formula is followed for
each model, and as such building material use can be
maximised. Also, since materials are stored in a factory
instead of on-site, they’re less likely to be stolen, vandalised
or damaged.
Pod homes are also much faster to build than with
traditional methods. Studies have shown that by the time a
The RWPA solutions stilt houses.
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NOVEMBER - DECEMBER 2018
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