Introduction

The year 2100 is very far from today, and I don’t even want to think that far, I have a lot on my mind just right now. But if you think about it, it is just 77 years from now. That means the beautiful children born the next few years will be just in their 70’s by then, and hopefully all of them happily retired.

But it also means, that any new house we build today, will be a “100-year-old” home then, maybe full of issue, which will cost a lot in upgrades, maintenance, and fixes. And many people in their 70s then will still be living in these houses.

The weather is also getting a bit harsher year over year, “a bit” each year will accumulate to “a lot” over 100 years, so the house we build today should be ready for a windy or a raining day in 2100.

Our challenge is, how to build a home today that will stay in a good condition in 2100 and how to reduce the burden on our next generation so they can focus on the things they want to focus on instead of keeping fixing that house.

Further from water

Water views are wonderful, and many of us would love to live on the water, we just need to be a bit further from it and build on a bit higher and stable ground.

Calculating the distance from the water is easy, take the high tides, add to them the maximum sea level storm surge, and add a few more meters just in case and build at the distance where the water cannot touch you.

Erosion must be also added into the consideration, solid rocks will be there for millennia, but other soil structure may easily erode once we remove the trees and replace them with houses. Avoid building houses at places that have possible erosion in the next a few or decades of years.

Tougher and Stronger

The question is how strong? Theoretically, we can build a house as strong as a tank! But will the cost be astronomical? The general rule is to look for the worst weather event in the last 100 years and prepare the house to withstand just a bit more than that event.

For example, if the worst hurricane that ever hit an area over the last 100 years was Category 2, then I believe building the home to withstand Category 3 should be sufficient.

In my opinion, the homes in 2100 should be prepared for a bit more frequent weather events (rain, wind, heat, cold, snow), but nothing on the scale of Hollywood movies, and we just need to prepare for that small change.

Long Lasting Materials

We all know that forever materials don’t exist, nature is constantly changing and eager to breakdown recycle everything around it, nevertheless, a good choice of materials, and proper maintenance, can delay that process significantly.

Now, there is no ideal choice, it all depends on the house design and location, in some cases concreate will be an excellent choice, in other cases wood framing and brick exterior will last longer, it depends on so many factors.

The important things to look for: how long will that combination of materials last, how much maintenance will it need when the time comes, and how much will it cost in today’s money to perform that maintenance.

Calculating the cost is a bit challenging, a 10,000$ dollar shingle roof that must be replaced once every 25 years will still actually cost the same as 20,000$ dollar metal roof that has to be replaced once every 50 years, in both cases you must put aside 30 dollars a month (adjusted for inflation) so you can use them for the roof replacement many years from now.

The ideal combination will be long-lasting and low-cost materials, and the good news is there is a lot of research is currently done in this area, and some of these materials are starting to reach market, things like fiber cement, and basalt fiber look very promising.

Focus on Architecture

Exterior architecture is important, we all want our homes to look good, so we pay attention to the shape, corners, mix materials, and mix colors, and that is fine in most of the cases. Now the longest lasting houses so far are 3 big stone pyramids built a few thousand years ago in the Sahara Desert, not practical for us today, but marvel of ancient engineering, architecture, and building practices, and unfortunately many people credit aliens for building them, which would have made their “Steve Jobs” back then very disappointed.

Anyway, all home designs are good, the focus should be on resistance to water, wind, heat and cold, no matter what the design is, it should get rid of rain and dry as quickly as possible, it should not accumulate snow, and it should be strong enough to handle the winds.

Insulation and Humidity

Insulating the house and keeping the outdoor cold air from the indoor space are important as well. Insulation keeps the house from the extreme hot or cold outdoor air. The outdoor heat mainly causes thermal comfort or even health issues for people, but the extreme cold outdoor air not only affects the thermal comfort but also causes damages to the house envelope.

Take an attic for example, if an attic is not insulated or not maintained well, the roof interior can be affected by the huge temperature change from day to night, thus the roof, attic and even the walls under the roof will not stay in good condition for long under such big temperature change that triggers material shrink and expand.

Beside the cold air, water is not welcome either. Good drainage system and ventilation are important for long-lasting houses as well, especially for winter in Canada. Building material like walls and roof are okay to get wet by the external rain or snow, but not good to have the water or vapor trapped inside the material, not only because it causes molding and decaying but also the Freeze-Thaw cycle can trigger material to expand and shrink thus crack and damage.

Conclusion

A properly built home will last longer, and the cost of house maintenance throughout its life cycle will not be necessarily high. Choosing a good building location, a good combination of quality materials and good heat/cold and water/wind control systems are the key factors to consider today.