Just add water, inflate a bag, and you have shelterTwo engineers at the Royal College of Art in London have invented a "building in a bag" - a sack of cement-impregnated fabric. Adding water and inflating it with air (I hope not manually, ouch) will result in a Nissen-shaped shelter 12 hours later.
The idea behind this contraption is that on-demand quick and durable shelter is sought-after in many situations. War zones and areas devastated by natural disaster are just two examples of where shelter is needed very quickly. The two current solutions are tents and prefabricated/portable buildings. Tents do not provide much protection, and portable buildings are expensive and difficult to transport. The building in a bag provides the portability of a tent with the strength of a prefabricated building.
Aid agency chiefs have been impressed by the simplicity and economy of the idea. A bag weighing 230 kilograms (approximately 500 pounds) inflates into a shelter with 16 square meters (172 square feet) of floor space. Cost is estimated at ?,100 ($2,100), while an equivalent-size Portakabin (a type of portable building widely used in the United Kingdom) costs about ?,000 ($7,700). The same-size tent costs about ?00 ($1,150).
This is very cool stuff - simple, yet extremely effective. It just goes to show that the simple inventions are the most impressive, and are the ones that make you slap your forehead and think "Why didn't I think of that?"
Article Link: Need a Building? Just Add Water
