Future house
2037: Home Sweet Home
Imagine that youre visiting an open house 30 years in the future. Solar panels hug the roof and a wind turbine spins wildly in the stiff spring breeze. Its raining heavily, yet there are no puddles underfoot. The rain is soaking into the pavement.
Snaking down the sides of the house are large downspouts that disappear into the ground and into what appear to be cisterns. Your ears catch the faint sound of voices and town activity coming from the back of the house, which, you are told, is actually the front.
This house seems backward with all its features from the past: cisterns, home gardens, delivery services, community green. As internationally recognized designer and engineer Chris Luebkeman said, things we once knew will come back again.
For decades we built houses how and where we wished, concerned only about comfort and style, with little thought to any long-term consequences. But the prospect of a planet with a changed climate is creating a different world.
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More from this series:
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About the project
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Kitchen of the future: Interactive comfort
The kitchen of the future is actually a giant, interactive workhorse of a computer the heart of which is a gleaming glass wall that holds a refrigerator, microwave oven, conventional oven and dishwasher. Its all fully integrated and at your command. -
Retrofitting: Not all homes will be new in 2037
Not everyone will be living in new houses come 2037. So what about your house, the neighbors house and all the existing buildings in Minnesota? They wont operate the way they do today, say architects and scientists. -
The road to the future
It’s not hard to imagine that the car of the future will adapt to help address the problems we face today — congested highways, rising gas prices, an ever-growing population, worsening pollution.