Superadobe: continuous earth-filled bags in domes
Superadobe: sacos de tierra continuos en cúpulas
- Date
- 1984 · confidence medium
- Place
- Hesperia, California, United States
- Credited to
- Nader Khalili
- Field
- Tools
What it is
Long fabric tubes filled with earth are coiled with barbed wire between courses to form domes and vaults without centring, resisting earthquakes and needing no timber. The idea began as a lunar shelter for NASA.
Khalili, an Iranian architect resident in the US, formulated the system in 1984 and developed it at the Cal-Earth Institute; earth-filled sacks for walls (sandbags, military forts) are earlier.
What it led to
- emergency shelters after earthquakes and in refugee camps
- low-cost earthbag houses
- earth domes in timber-poor regions