The construction industry is a major contributor to global carbon emissions, responsible for approximately 40% of the total. To address increasing concerns about climate change, environmental degradation, natural disasters, and diminishing of natural resources, sustainable constructive materials and manufacturing could be used as an alternative in communities with high environmental risk to build resilience and mitigate the social and economic impacts of weather-related natural disasters. Herein, this study will focus on how tiny house design combined with the use of life cycle assessment (LCA) and material selection charts can support decision making to mitigate natural disasters’ consequences on the housing sector. A tiny house (TH) accommodating a family of four people was designed for the Southwestern region of the United States to be a suitable alternative to reduce housing deficit and was used as a functional unit for the LCA. To find the best materials combination, this study reviews material physical properties and LCAs to assess the environmental impacts (cradle-to-gate LCA, covering extraction and manufacturing stages) and determines the advantages of using different materials in early design-stages of the housing sector threatened by natural disasters. The results of different perspectives indicate that, for the Los Angeles area, compressed earth blocks (CEB) lightly stabilized with cement (10%), settled with polymeric mortar, with frames in wood would be the recommended material combination to resist a wildfire scenario among the evaluated materials. Among the types of roofing, none was considered adequate for this scenario, and although standing seam metal had the best performance for durability and strength, it was the most impactful considering acidification, ozone depletion, and carbon footprint. This evaluation considered market, mechanical properties and environmental impacts associated with manufacturing of the selected materials and selected the combination that provided physical and thermal performances that provided higher resilience on new disaster occurrences, while generating the least environmental impacts.
Cassundé et al. (Thu,) studied this question.