#GoodNews: Tamil Nadu Engineer Helps Build Home With Eggs, Jaggery

Tamil Nadu engineer is helping building a home with jaggery and egg whites.

(Photo Courtesy: The Better India)

(Photo: The Quint)

People have often turned to using bamboo and mud to construct sustainable homes, and there is no doubt that the trend will not go away anytime soon. But who would have thought that one can also build homes in the most unconventional way using jaggery and eggs?

A resident of Vellakoil in Tamil Nadu's Tirupur district, Jawahar C, is currently supervising the construction of his 3,200 square feet home, which is being built with jaggery and egg whites.

He stated, “Our ancestors built and lived in eco-friendly homes, that were well-ventilated, sturdy, and served all their needs. I was deeply inspired by them and wanted to do something similar. Besides, construction activities can be extremely polluting. We are anyway facing a severe scarcity of natural resources, so why burden the earth further?,” according to The Better India.

Jawahar thought of the only person who could turn it into something tangible — his nephew, Aravind Manoharan.

Manoharan, the 27-year-old engineer runs a sustainable construction company called, 'Pizhai Azhagu' which founded in 2018. In the company, buildings are constructed using traditional techniques and locally available materials.

Both Manoharan and Jawahar had not thought about the materials initially and engaged with the local masons and old people in the area to get some inputs.

To their surprise, many people that they interviews had traditional courtyard style homes built using muds and ingredients like jaggery as a binding agent.

“They also informed us that they built these homes themselves as there were very few companies at the time,” said Manoharan.

He added that jaggery acts as great bonding agent while the use of egg whites in the plaster gives the walls a polished look.

Jawahar's Home to Be Ready By End of Year

The construction of the house began in the last week of February 2019 and it is expected to be complete by the end of this year.

The walls are being used with the traditional bricks but in place of cement, they made a mixture of lime mortar, sand, jaggery, crushed Kadukkai (yellow myrobalan) and water.

Plastering on the bricks is done in fiv layers, which helps ensuring the breathability of the building with more oxygen inside.

The roofs of the house use recycled wood that is sourced from the nearby Karaikudi old wood market. Plantain leaves or lotus leaves are placed between the wood and the bricks to ensure safety from termite attack.

The only wait now is for bethamcherla stone which will be used in the flooring with the lime, and that will make the construction of the building complete.

(With inputs from The Better India)