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1.8.1 The
present housing in Auroville consists of individual dwellings, community
housing, apartments and youth hostels. Community housing provides for
individual and family living spaces with common kitchen and other collective
facilities. The average household size is around 2 persons but in reality
there are many single person households. At present there are 767 dwelling
units of various sizes. Types of houses based on construction materials
indicate that the majority of the houses have used local materials as
well as innovative building materials such as ferrocement roofs and panels
made locally. The housing characteristics are shown in Table 7.
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1.8.2 Since
Auroville is experimenting with appropriate construction elements, wall
materials vary widely from adobe, stabilised earth blocks and rammed earth
to fired bricks. Auroville has even experimented with the 'fire bricks
house' technique, where the entire structure is built in earth and fired
like a kiln, producing a innovatively constructed house. The architecture
here reflects the practice of innovative design and alternative building
materials. The experiments made in building technology in Auroville will
have far-reaching implications in terms of design and materials, of reduction
in energy consumption, and adoption of eco-friendly practices.
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