A Waterloo School of Architecture professor’s amphibious house research in Vietnam is featured as a Global Best Practice project at Expo 2020 Dubai opening today in the United Arab Emirates.
Elizabeth English’s award-winning work on the development of amphibious technologies for retrofitting existing homes will be prominently showcased for the month of October in the Opportunity Pavilion that addresses major global challenges and is home to the United Nations Hub.
Two videos produced by the BBC – How amphibious housing is transforming lives, narrated by English, and Keeping Our Heads Above Water – accompany the Waterloo exhibit.
A retrofitted buoyant house owned by a rice farmer in Vietnam floats on the surface of rising flood waters.
English, the founder and director of the Buoyant Foundation Project, a not-for-profit organization based in Breaux Bridge, Louisiana, and Cambridge, Ontario, designs buoyant houses for flood-prone areas throughout the world, including south Louisiana, the Canadian north, Jamaica and Vietnam.
The project’s retrofitted structures float on the surface of rising floodwaters and then come to rest on the ground as the waters dissipate. The earth-friendly approach works in synchrony with natural flood cycles, rather than trying to control the forces of nature.
English’s work focuses on retrofitted houses rather than new structures, which she says should not be built in wetlands or on flood plains.
“We need to be supporting the communities of people who have been living in the same place for generations and, in some cases, hundreds of years,” said English. “They deserve to be able to stay in the place they love if they are able to stay there safely.”
The Buoyant Foundation Project has designed several amphibious houses, built two prototypes and retrofitted four houses owned by rice farmers in Vietnam.
The houses in Vietnam were retrofitted with bundled gasoline jugs used to displace water and other floatation devices.
English’s amphibious house research is becoming significantly more important with the increase in flooding due to climate change or exacerbated by climate change. Much of the flooding can also be attributed to human-made upriver development, she says.
The Buoyant Foundation Project has been featured in publications such as the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal and the New Yorker, and recognized with honours, including first place in the sustainable products category of the 2019 Architecture MasterPrize Product Design Award.
Postponed last year because of the COVID-19 pandemic, Expo 2020 Dubai runs from October 1, 2021, until March 31, 2022.
More than 190 countries, including Canada, have pavilions at the world exposition, which has three core themes – Opportunity, Sustainability and Mobility.
Due to the University of Waterloo’s current ban on international travel because of the virus, English is not in Dubai for the opening of her exhibit. However, she hopes to visit it in person whenever the University’s travel restrictions are lifted.
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