Building houses from dirty diapers might sound far-fetched, but it's a highly serious proposal from researchers who tried and tested the idea on a prototype house in Indonesia.
Disposable diapers represent 2% to 7% of all household waste worldwide. Given that used diapers are neither entirely compostable nor entirely biodegradable, the majority of them are incinerated, which contributes to polluting the atmosphere. But their status as waste is not the only problem, since their production, which uses a lot of water, is also problematic and harmful to the planet. An international team of researchers from the University of Kitakyushu in Japan has come up with a way to extend the lifespan of these products while reducing their environmental impact and providing an alternative to one of the most widely used and polluting construction materials: concrete.