Shipping containers have been a favorite material for building tiny homes in recent years. It provides another way for these metal objects to be reused again. They have also been hyped as an eco-friendly material and a viable structure for sustainable housing.
Now, we can probably see more tiny homes made from these containers as extra shipping containers were made during the pandemic due to supply chain issues. Approximately, there are around 4.3 million containers left in ports in the United States. So here’s the question: is this kind of material really sustainable?
The general answer is yes, but there’s something else here– the builders need to have enough knowledge, resources, and money to make it a sustainable home. While they can be bought second-hand, people still need to retrofit the containers to create a home. “There are still many alterations that need to be made in order for [them] to be habitable,” architect Alex Gore shared. “You need to frame out the walls, floors, and ceilings in order to run electrical and plumbing lines, as well as insulate.”
Provided that these revisions will be made with eco-friendly materials, then these structures can be more sustainable. However, these materials aren’t really commonly used.
In addition, the architect also believes that these containers are not the right housing material. “Containers are scaled to house goods, not people,” Gore said. “Their proportions make it hard to accommodate human activities.”
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