Anyone considering a large earthbag project should look into the advantages of mechanizing the building process with machinery since construction work by its nature is labor intensive. A foundation trench for instance could be dug by a mini-excavator or backhoe in a few hours versus a week of manual labor. The same trench could be filled very quickly with gravel using the same machine.
Earthbag Building
Grassroots Movement Building Earthbag Schools in Nepal
In collaboration with Good Earth Nepal.org and donations from the Schoeck Family Foundation, we’ve been touring earthbag projects near Kathmandu. We’ve seen numerous earthbag schools in our travels, but haven’t noticed any new conventionally built RCC/brick schools.
Finding Good Tools in Developing Countries
Getting good tools in developing countries is challenging since the market is flooded with very low quality products. Often the tools are worthless within minutes or a few hours of use. Sometimes they never work. For instance, I bought a screwdriver a few weeks ago that stripped out on the first screw. This is not unusual. It’s actually very common in poor countries.
Sewing Gusseted Earthbags
Touring earthbag building projects in Nepal has allowed us to gather hundreds of photos, dozens of hours of video footage, and discover lots of interesting new earthbag techniques and developments. I now have fresh content for lots of future blog posts. The volunteers and workers here are very good and so there’s quite a bit of innovation taking place. The photo above is one example of how earthbag builders in Nepal are improving the building process by sewing perfect corners on earthbags.
Live from Nepal: Tour Update #1
As most readers have already heard, I am touring earthbag projects near Kathmandu in collaboration with Good Earth Nepal.org (winner of NEA design award). Every day is exciting, informative and productive even though there are many challenges traveling in rural areas on heavily damaged mountain roads. For instance, the “main road” to China, which one would think is a major trade route, in some places looks like a bulldozer simply cleared aside a crude path on top of millions of tons of rocks. And that is in fact what it is!
Grandma Krishna’s Earthbag Home in Nepal
“Initially, on paper, I figured that it would be cheap to build earthbag houses. After many years of research, while I was studying and working in the UK, and after the twin earthquakes of 2015, it made more sense to me to give this method a try and promote it. I finally made the jump and started building a small earthbag home for the sweet old lady from my community here in Chiti VDC Lamjung. I found some hidden surprises associated with the build.