In January / February The SRU team spent three weeks in temperatures between -15°C and -30°C down to a perceived -40°C (with a wind chill fac-tor of -44°C) to field test the cold-climate tents developed in the course of the year within different projects.

The development of the extreme cold climate shelter for Mongolia as well as the field testing were funded by British Red Cross in support of the Mongolian Red Cross Society’s (MRCS) con-tingency planning in case of an earthquake striking the capi-tal Ulaan Baatar. The field tests were facilitated by MRCS and the Mongolian National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA).

a total number of ten tents were included in the tests which were set-up:

● The standard family tent

● The improved dome tent with winter kit, (a family tent under development by a consortium of UNHCR/IFRC/ICRC to be-come the new standard)

● A winter-tent solutions do na ted by a Canadian supplier

● Five variations of the Turkish Red Crescent (TRC) winter tent, experimenting with different layers of innovative insulating materials

● The final prototype of the TRC winter tent developed by SRU

● The prototype of the winter tent developed by SRU for the cold climate context in Mongolia.

While the standard family tent was included in the tests to

NEWSLETTER 6 / English version MARCH 2015

UPCoMInG EvEnt ConferenCe on ‚Winterization’ Luxembourg, 20–21 may 2015 IThe IFRC-SRU will host its fourth annual conference in Luxembourg on May 20 and 21, 2015. Answering to the demand from the field and the interest confirmed in the topic during last years conference, the fo-cus of the conference will be on “Winterization”.

IFRC-SRU will present its re-search on insulation materials and the results of the testing of 10 tent models in Ulaan Bataar in January/February 2015.

Contributions from Red Cross Red Crescent National Societies and other humani-tarian actors as well as from researchers on aspects of hu-manitarian shelter interventions in cold climates are still wel-come. Please feel free to con-tact us with your proposals.

As the venue has limited places, please make sure you register for the conference here: www.shelter-database.org. ■

SRU team in the cold climate shelter

establish the baseline for the minimum performance, the Canadian tent from one of the market leaders in cold climate shelters, was meant to serve as reference for high-level per-formance of winterized shelters.

According to our knowledge such comparative testing of different tent or shelter models has not been done before by any other organization.

Based on our preliminary re-search on human comfort pa-rameters including recom men-dations of the World Health Organisation and other sources, we established 15°C as the minimum temperature to pro-vide thermal comfort.

The test-methodology was set up to collect quantitative as well as qualitative data in order

ifrC-srUtEStInG Cold ClIMatE ShEltERS

In 2011, The IFRC SRU conduct-ed a first documentation of shel-ter-practices in Bangladesh, mainly in the flood and cyclone prone plains in the south of the country. The research, mostly technically oriented revealed some critical opportunities to improve sheltering, such as widely introducing the practice of cross-bracing, or adapting sheltering better to local con-struction practices.

In 2014, the IFRC SRU had the opportunity, to expand this re-search to more remote regions of Bangladesh. Supported by

to evaluate the performance of the tents within three cat-egories of criteria: Logistical, Technical, Human comfort.

For the logistics part the meas-urable criteria like weight, vol-ume and unit price were record-ed for each of the models. Of equally high importance how-ever are the more qualitative criteria of how to transport and handle the package and how fast the shelters can be set-up by unskilled volunteers with only the tools provided within the shelter package. These in-dicators were recorded through observations, questionnaires with the volunteers involved, as well recording the set-up time for each model.

To record the technical per-formance a variety of different measurements were taken under different circumstanc-es. For the thermal perform-ance, the air temperature and humidity was recorded over several 12h periods in differ-

“Friendship”, a well established Bangladeshi NGO, based in Dakar the regions of Sylhet, Rangamati, Cox’s Bazar and Gaibandha were studied. Seven days of fieldwork allowed to deepen the research, and iden-tify specific vulnerabilities such as areas prone to landslides or the char land (islands).

This fieldwork was followed by a four day national workshop with a large representation of tech-nically oriented members of the shelter sector including repre-sentatives from the Department of Disaster Management

ent locations in each tent. The first test run was done with electrical heaters and the fur-ther ones with the commonly used coal stoves all fired with the same amount of coal (pre-weighed portions) at the same intervals of time. Furthermore surface temperature and hu-midity of the different materi-als were recorded at different times of the day to give in-sight on condensation as well as the transmissivity of the materials.

To assure appropriate air-quality inside the tents with

burning stoves the CO2 and CO levels, as well as ventila-tion rate were recorded.

The temperature tests with burning stoves were run in all tents to establish which tents could assure a minimum tem-perature of 15°C throughout a night time heating period. As the second round of test was done with volunteers sleeping in the tents over night, the first round served to exclude tents that would not provide a mini-mum of thermal comfort.

Only three tents made it over 0°C and only the two SRU de-signs actually kept a tempera-ture of 15°C and even higher. These were tested by NEMA volunteers who slept in the tents and recorded their feed-back on a whole set of comfort and usability parameters.

Finally additional test were run to investigate interior illumi-nation as well as noise levels. Parameters that are not criti-

Local shelter response to a hazardous site in the Rangamati area

cal for survival but quite el-ementary for overall comfort and frequently flagged in ben-eficiary feedback collected throughout previous tests.

Altogether 18 different tests were conducted and over 300,000 measurements record-ed largely by automatic data loggers and the weather station that was et up on the site to pro-vide the reference temperature and humidity data.

first ConCLusions: The first observations and anal-ysis of the tests clearly point at the importance of considering the different cladding element with regard to their main func-tion. That means prioritizing different features like insulating factor, airtightness, reflectivity for the different materials used for the floor, walls and roof. Furthermore, special attention needs to be dedicated to all openings as well as seams and closing systems like zippers.

Finally, the position of the stove within the shelter is critical.

IFRC-SRU will be presenting the test methodology and the results in more detail at the annual conference on “Winterization”, May 20–21 in Luxemburg. ■

Overview test-site

Briefing the NEMA volunteersTest set-up for the test

with volunteers

UPdatE: teChniCal shelter workshop Bangladesh

Bangladesh Technical Shelter Wokshop ParticipantsOpening speach by Runa Khan, CEO of Friendship Bangladesh

The workshop also explored the use of traditional versus modern industrial materials

and the Housing & Building Research Institute, from six lo-cal NGO’s, eight INGO’s, the IFRC as Shelter Cluster lead during Emergencies and UNDP as Shelter Cluster lead outside of Emergencies. The partici-pants came from eleven differ-ent regions of Bangladesh. The Luxembourg Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Luxembourg Red Cross provided funding for both the fieldwork and the workshop.

The objective of the workshop was, together with the prima-ry shelter actors in the coun-try and with the support of the

Government, to expand and consolidate technical shelter knowledge in Bangladesh, to-wards the development of national shelter strategies. A group field visit and a know-ledge bazaar were organized for the workshop in addition to the presentations, working ses-sions and plenary discussions.

Key-messages on topics such as emergency and recovery sheltering, site organization, structures, cladding and tech-nical capacity building were formulated and strategic pref-erences agreed upon. (for full report see IFRC-SRU.org).

One of the main outcomes of the workshop is that further and more systematic consoli-dation of shelter knowledge would present a great leap forward in improving shelter-ing responses in Bangladesh. The workshop was concluded with recommendations as to the way forward in terms of developing national shelter strategies, on the basis of the conclusions already obtained in this workshop. Bangladesh Government is following up on the recommendations by prospecting to hold another National Consultation in April 2015. ■

IFRC representative demonstrating the shelter kit to the workshop participants

After a long and somewhat bumpy road the first version of the Shelter Database is fi-nally online!

It is still a work in progress but already gives a good idea of what it will become and the incredible value this tool will have for all of us who work in sheltering, be it immediately after disaster, during recon-struction or even for long-term impact evaluations.

Now we need your help and feedback to take the next steps. Please follow this link and have a look at the database to the test-server: http://www.shelter-database.org

Here you will be able to con-sult the Shelters already doc-umented in Haiti. To enter your own shelter, you can create your user account and login, and you will have access to the online entry format. The

key data needed to enter a new shelter are the GPS co-ordinates and the name. You can try it out, save your test shelter and modify it later, up-load photos and documenta-tion and fill in as much infor-mation you are ready to share into the provided format. The Shelter will only be published online after you confirm the submission and we activate it to be published. After pub-lishing you will still be able to

modify your entries. Feel free to test and try!

Your feedback on any aspects of the database; be it the docu-mentation method, user friend-liness of the interface, search criteria etc. is most welcome! Please don’t hesitate to let us know what you think! ■

WoRKShoPdesigning sheltering systems

tEal – ShEltERInG CoURSE 2015 (tEMPoRaRy aRChItECtURE, tExtIlE tEChnoloGy, lIGhtWEIGht ConStRUCtIon)

As experts in humanitarian shelter solutions the SRU were invited to participate in the event organised by the Technical University of Milan.

The main goal of the course was to stimulate students to apply a “lightweight thinking” both in the design and in the construc-tion phases; this means to not use an obtrusive approach on the built environment -focusing on temporary buildings instead of permanent ones - and the landscape in general - focus-ing on the use of minimal mass and construction materials- to be used in the most resourceful way. Different themes were ap-proached though a set of lec-tures that dealt with sheltering design adopting a multidiscipli-nary approach.

The University of Milan is con-sidering to have PHD students collaborate with SRU on the de-velopment of emergency shel-ter solutions. ■

BREaKInG nEWS: shelter dataBase online!

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During 2011 a consortium of IFRC/ICRC and UNHCR launched a Research and Development (R&D) project with the goal to de-velop a new standards family tent model with improved perform-ance regarding weight, stability, usability, comfort and safety. The aim is to propose a light weight self-supporting structure, to re-duce logistics cost, provide fire-

retardant cladding for higher safety and also explore insulation options for winterisation options.

In 2013 comparative testing of three different prototypes was undertaken by the consortium in three different locations (see IFRC-SRU Newsletter 3). Based on the findings a new prototype has been developed.

ContaCt

ifrc-sru@croix-rouge.lu

IFRC - SRU Cité Henri Dunant 10, L-8095 Bertrange Tél. 27 55 - 89 02

Supported by the Red Cross Societies of the BENELUX

RECaP

The main objective of S(P)EEDKITS is to devel-op kits of different size and complexity for a number of humanitarian applications, shel ter, water and sanitation, communication and medi-cal infrastructure as well as debris recycling and software tools to support warehous-ing and rapid deployment. S(P)EEDKITS targets a smart (re-)design of existing/nov-el kits via smart packaging and introduction of the latest technological developments from a wide range of domains. Within the S(P)EEDKITS project SRU is in charge of the shelter development com-ponent of the project.

The solutions are to be optimized for rapid deployment while at the same time providing “seeds” for the long term self-recovery process after a disaster. SRU is overseeing the design, develop-ment and testing of four types of shelters that correspond to different uses from family to community scale. Flexible to be combined in various ways the proposed types should serve to cover the all shelter needs dur-ing emergency operations.

WoRK In PRoGRESS:

The first phase of the develop-ment of these shelter-types,

has been dedicated mainly on the cladding materials. Various materials were tested to com-pare their performances re-garding the relevant criteria (weight, cost, strength, dura-bility, water-proofness, thermal properties). New materials like thermo-regulating fabrics were also explored. Some of the main results were presented at the cladding and fixing conference in September 2014 (http://ifrc-sru.org/conference-presentations/cladding-and-fixing-conference/)

Based on these findings we are developing a “membrane selec-tion tool” to support decision makers to better understand the implication of their choice.

Currently the focus is on the op-timization of the structural ele-ments for the different shelter types as well as their inter-con-nectivity. For the clever roof and the smart tarp the structural el-ements needed for stabilisation are being optimized. For the multipurpose unit a structure without guy-ropes is envisaged. The mobile modular unit’s the performance facing harsh con-text with wind and snow loads has been examined through a series of lab-scale tests and is already drastically improved. A new prototype scale 1/1 has been built and is ready for test-ing in a field location to obtain the end users feedback and finalize the development. ■

Final field testing to confirm the performance as well as beneficiary satisfaction will be undertaken by IFRC-SRU according to the established methodology and beneficiary satisfaction survey question-naires.

The testing in hot climate is taking place in Burkina Faso

during March, April and May while the cold climate testing is planned for end of the year in Pakistan. The field testing will conclude this joint R&D project and the specifications for the final model of the new stand-ard family tent are expected to be ready for entry in the Emergency Items catalogue by the beginning of 2016. ■

Clever roof: an ultra-light weight unit to provide first protection against rain and sun, for families but also for aid-workers e.g. during distributions etc.

SmarttaRP: based on a 3D textile structure that can provide a versatile material for the affected populations to use in combination with other materials or shelter components to set up an simple shelter as well as to repair or (re-) build) their homes.

Multipurpose unit:

designed to be used for example as a small medical unit, a dispensary an office, an orphanage, and for any other activities generally requiring more space than the family unit.

Mobile modular unit:

the idea is to create a medium size warehouse unit of 120sqm to provide covered space for multiple humanitarian uses at a lower cost/sqm than the commonly used 250sqm warehouse-tents. As per need, the light structure can be reinforced to withstand snow loads.

thE FolloWInG tyPES oF ShEltERS aRE UndER dEvEloPMEnt:

tEStInG In PRoGRESS the new standard family tent

PRojECt UPdatE