Combining cardboard and timber to deliver sustainable, cost-effective emergency housing

Extensive use of cardboard reduces the cost and environmental impact of the panels, meaning builders of temporary housing are less exposed to the shortages and soaring costs of traditional construction materials.
Cardboard is one of the most highly recycled materials for packaging in Australia so there’s no impact on waste generated and no increase in resource consumption. You're essentially extending the service life of that material before it gets recycled again.

The panels have also been used in a prototype ‘cardboard house’ constructed at UQ’s Pinjarra Hills Research Facility and have held up well to the wet Queensland summer.

The panels are intended for short-term use, possibly for temporary housing or granny flats for people displaced by natural disasters

The fact they are lighter means they will be easier to lift and fit together quickly in a post-disaster scenario, where temporary structures are in high demand.

We need systems that suit short-term use cases as there's a lot of need for this class of accommodation in Australia, and internationally.

The cardboard house also recently weathered the wild winds and torrential rains experienced by Brisbane as tropical cyclone Alfred made landfall.

Both Mahmoud and I have kept the elements at bay by incorporating the same principles used for timber-clad homes – including substantial eaves, often seen on iconic Queenslander-style homes.

Mahmoud states that while replacing some of the monolithic cardboard in the TCS with the air gaps reduced the weight, this could also reduce the insulation effectiveness of the panels.

This could be addressed in future by adding another waste material like paper into the air gaps to improve their insulation properties.