Sandbags have a long history of use in flood control. United Bags, Inc., for example, has supplied sandbags to the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers and the public for 117 years. Sandbags play a critical role in building and fortifying dikes and levees to protect our communities. The bags are low cost and easily transported … Read more
In an effort to track down the history of earthbag building, I’ve been reading up on the history of burlap bags – the forerunner to polypropylene bags. This post is based on information at NYP Corporation, a wholesaler of burlap bags. (See “Jute to Burlap.”) For centuries, the people of India used jute, the plant … Read more
There is an ongoing debate over the origins of earthbag building — who ‘invented’ it and when. It is an important point that gets into sticky questions about patent rights of building with earthbags. Some accounts of military sandbag structures go back over 100 years. I haven’t seen pictures of these, but a recent Google … Read more
We live in interesting and somewhat precarious times. No one can say for certain that they are immune from economic collapse, civil disturbance or even war. With the world’s escalating financial, environmental and political problems lately, anything is possible. All the many benefits of earthbags are reported on our EarthbagBuilding.com website – low cost, simplicity … Read more