Manufacturers, inventors, and futurists all over the world have been fixated on the idea of 3D printing, noting its speed, efficiency, accessibility, and long-term potential to revolutionize how we develop prototypes and manufacture goods. Now, entrepreneurs, investors, and real estate experts are wondering how 3D printing could be used in residential construction to provide more housing for everyday citizens.
Property management in Houston and other big cities make rental properties more affordable and accessible to urban residents in the developed world, but construction in less developed areas tends to be more expensive—and harder to execute, despite the needs of local populations.
So could 3D printing be a realistic solution to build housing in the developing world? Or could it one day be used to create cheap housing in the United States and in other developed nations?
Where We Stand
Right now, the construction startup ICON and the housing nonprofit New Story are capable of 3D printing inexpensive housing. Their prototype model is approximately 650 square feet, complete with a bedroom, living room, kitchen, bathroom, and porch. They can build a model like this in just under a day, for less than $10,000. When building in developing countries, the costs can be reduced to just $4,000, making it an affordable way to build reliable housing for practically anyone on the planet.
This is the United States’ first real foray into the world of 3D printing as a means of home construction, though startups in other countries (like Russia and China) have followed a similar process. New Story now hopes to fund a 100-home community in El Salvador as its first major project, hoping to allow new residents to move in by the third quarter of 2019. In the near future, when the technology is better perfected and regulations become more accepting, 3D printing could feasibly be used to build housing throughout the United States.
The Tiny House Movement
Momentum for 3D printed housing could be fueled by the tiny house movement, which has captivated hipsters, environmentalists, and minimalists all over the country. The 650-square-foot living space is luxurious by tiny house standards, and achieves all the goals of the average community member. If the trend continues, it could motivate an entire demographic to jump on these affordable, accessible, cozy living spaces.
Environmental Sustainability
3D-printed housing is also extremely environmentally sustainable:
- Materials. The 3D printing process relies almost exclusively on sustainable materials, including concrete, which enables 3D printing to make much less of an impact on the environment than a typical construction process.
- Pollution. Because the machinery involved is precise, efficient, and carefully controlled, it also produces less pollution.
- Injuries and fatalities. 3D printing doesn’t require as many risky human activities, like climbing to great heights or lifting heavy objects, so injuries and fatalities during home construction would be sharply reduced.
The Propensity to Scale
3D printing is also friendly to scaling. Machines are largely automated, so human supervision is only minimally required, and because an entire house can be completed in 24 hours or less, a single machine can churn out hundreds of houses a year. As the technology becomes more sophisticated, capable of building houses in less time and with fewer materials, the range of possible applications could grow even faster.
The Limitations
There are, however, some limitations to this technology:
- Slow advancement. Current prototypes are small, simple houses, but it’s going to be many years—or even decades—before 3D printing advances enough to work on skyscrapers, or is capable of working with more diverse designs and materials.
- Conservative adoption. The construction industry has historically been slow to change. While nimble startups might be free to innovate new technologies and new solutions, if large-scale construction companies refuse to invest or change their current approaches, it won’t do the average homeowner much good.
- Initial investments. A mainstream concrete printer, onsite, currently costs between $500,000 and $2,000,000—and a device like that is limited to producing relatively small buildings. Getting started with a 3D printing venture is cost prohibitive to most entrepreneurs, even if the buildings themselves end up relatively cheap.
- The complexity of the jobsite. Machines work phenomenally when under ideal conditions, but they aren’t great at adapting to sudden or unexpected changes, like a turn in the weather; accordingly, many job sites will require additional human supervision.
- Regulations and engineering. 3D construction is still new territory, which means it may be a while before developed countries like the United States are willing to allow it to be used openly for residential construction.
Companies and organizations like ICON and New Story are ahead of the curve. It may be some time before we see 3D-printed homes emerging on the market in the United States, but we’re on the right track to both affordable, accessible housing, and a sustainable method for tackling bigger construction projects.