London-based consulting engineer Battle McCarthy, which designed the system, is to build 30 000 of the high-tech homes over two years. It is working with South Bank University and the BRE from the UK, plus Hong Kong Polytechnic and Chongquing University in Sichuan province, central China.
The team is offering its services free to the Chinese government in exchange for the opportunity to test the system on a scale unimaginable in the UK. Battle McCarthy expects to use the design in urban regeneration schemes in London and other cities around the world.
Battle McCarthy director Chris McCarthy, who based the design on 19th-century housing familiar in London, said: "It is easier and quicker to test a prototype in China that has the advantages of a huge scale with all the European engineers and manufacturers in place." McCarthy added that the UK produces only 200 000 new housing units a year.
The first 10 demonstration houses are set for completion by the end of this year in Chongquing, one of the four largest urban areas in China. Then the scheme will go into mass production, with 15 000 homes built in 2002 and another 15 000 in 2003. McCarthy expects the programme to continue into 2004.
Each five-storey steel-framed house, clad in brick or an variety of environment-friendly cladding systems, will be made up of six flexible units that include a staircase.
Other sustainable features include solar roof panels and provision for rainwater collection. The homes are also kitted out with IT systems to control centralised locking, electronic curtains and movement detection sensors, all of which have been designed to UK and European specifications. The homes will meet National House Building Council and Zurich housing standards.
The Chinese construction ministry will fund the manufacture of the modular parts from Chuang Dong shipyard, 75 miles from Chongquing, with the help of students from Chongquing University's 12 000-strong construction faculty.
A local supply chain of subcontractors has also been established to develop the buildings' components from start to finish.
The houses will take up to six months to assemble and the base core could be built in a matter of weeks – half the time of traditional methods.
The project is one of 12 trials now looking into immediate large-scale low-budget sustainable accommodation throughout China.
There is an acute need for housing in China, which will be exacerbated by the displacement of 3 million people, many in Sichuan province, by the Three Gorges Dam across the Yangtze next year.
