Shipping Container Cities to Shelter 2 Million Haitians From Hurricanes

There's been a lot of <a href="../tag/gulf-of-mexico-oil-spill/" target="_blank">disasters this year</a>, but the aftermath of the <a href="../tag/haiti-earthquake" target="_blank">Haiti Earthquake</a> has left the country in a dire state and with hurricane season approaching, <strong>2 million people are without adequate shelter and living in tents</strong>. Relief in the form of shipping container housing is in progress, but <strong>help is still needed. </strong>Richard Moreta and his team, <a href="http://green-container-intl-aid.com" target="_blank">Green Container International Aid</a>, who we covered back in February, have been working on securing a large number of used shipping containers for use in their <a href="http://inhabitat.com/2010/02/26/dominican-authorities-approve-of-container-cities-for-haiti-housing-relief/" target="_blank"><strong>Container Cities</strong></a>. Moreta recently sent us an email <a href="http://green-container-intl-aid.com/manifesto" target="_blank">asking for support for the people of Haiti</a> -- specifically he needs help amplifying his message to authorities, those in power or with business connections to donate shipping containers and help save lives. <strong>Please read on and spread the word!</strong>

With the hurricane season, which starts in June, quickly approaching, far too many victims are still without a home or even adequate shelter. Tents are certainly not strong enough many buildings are damaged and likely not strong enough to withstand hurricane force winds.

Green Container International Aid is a group of people working towards providing real housing solutions to the victims of the earthquake, and right now they need a massive donation of shipping containers sent to Haiti to provide emergency shelters.

The emergency shelters will at first be fairly basic, enough to last through the hurricane season. The shipping containers will first be outfitted with a new paint job, a green roof, rain water collector and storage units, a shading screen, and screen doors to keep out mosquitoes.

After emergency shelters have been provided additional work can be done on the container homes to make them more livable and comfortable.

Ideally these units would be outfitted with solar panels and wind energy systems to provide off-grid power rather than relying on the grid.

After time spent on the ground in Haiti, Richard Moreta and his team learned first hand what could work. They currently have a pilot program underway in Jacmel, which lies along the Caribbean Sea, in the Southern part of Port-Au-Prince.

Other villages are being identified now where work can start once the group receives more shipping containers. Smaller 20' containers can be delivered to rural areas, while the 40' containers are more appropriate for larger cities.

The shipping containers can be stacked on top of one another to create apartments style buildings to accommodate more people.

Hapag-Lloyd, the world's largest container company, has already donated 5 shipping containers to the project and is shipping them to Haiti, but MANY MANY more containers are needed.

The containers are sparse and basic, but functional and certainly better than living in a tent, which will not withstand the hurricane season and cannot be kept clean.

Green Container International Aid has developed a series of versatile sustainable solutions ranging from rural to urban-compatible settings also include green roofs, solar arrays, storm-water run-off management, reducing water consumption and bio-climatic technology solutions to make these projects zero-energy.

Moreta and his team of experts are collaborating closely with the local population in Haiti and the neighboring Dominican Republic (which will be used as a logistical base support) will re-design and recondition these containers in a new urban grid to help the decentralization of the main cities. This strategy will alleviate the non-functional spontaneous settlements that impede any future cohesive development.

Time is running out though. June is quickly approaching and the organization needs thousands of containers to provide adequate housing for the victims. Support their efforts by spreading the word and hopefully we can convince some larger companies to donate their used containers.