Giving Compass' Take:

• Adele Peters reports on the efforts of New Story, a startup working to produce low-cost, 3D-printed homes for low-income families in Latin America. 

• Is this a sustainable, useful way to build houses? What are the potential drawbacks for the communities impacted?  

• Read about the future of homebuilding innovation. 

In a lab in Austin, a team of engineers and materials scientists tweaked and tested the design of the “Vulcan II,” a massive, 33-by-11-foot machine that can 3D print the frame of a small house in less than a day. Later this year, it will begin printing a neighborhood of more than 50 homes.

The new neighborhood–the first of its kind in the world–will be built in a semi-rural part of Latin America for families who earn less than $200 a month. “We’re bringing very futuristic technology to the families that need it most first,” says Brett Hagler, CEO and cofounder of New Story, a Silicon Valley-based nonprofit that is working with Icon, the Austin-based construction tech company that developed the new machine.

The Vulcan II builds walls and floors by squirting layers of concrete, and can finish a house in a day or less. Adding a conventional roof, windows, and utilities can be completed a day later. After printing an initial test home in a backyard in Austin in 2018, the team kept refining the design of both the house and the equipment. One addition was a simple interface so that it would be easier to operate. “Something that’s really important to us as an international development organization is the ability for the machine to be operated by local talent,” says Alexandria Lafci, cofounder and head of operations of New Story. (Though the construction process provides fewer jobs per home than traditional building, it offers the chance to learn new technical skills.) Most of the process is automated, including mixing materials. “There was a moment [last week] where our staff was in the lab printing, and we all just sat around for hours–no one did anything–as walls were getting built,” says Jason Ballard, cofounder and CEO of Icon. The printer is designed to be durable enough to be transported to remote locations and to be used outside, continuously, for months or even years.

Read the full article about a community of low-cost 3D-printed homes by Adele Peters at Fast Company.