Unveiling the potential of the earthen structures in the context of Turkey

Natural building materials and construction techniques are recognized for their capacity to enhance the sustainability of the built environment, as their carbon footprint, both at the production and use phase, are lower compared to the commonly used construction materials in the industry. Among these materials, earth material has regained significant attention over the last decade. Yet their use is scarce, especially in urban zones not only in Turkey but also across the world. Regardless of the difficulty of standardization in the production and manufacturing stages of these techniques and materials sustainability issues have brought them back to our agenda. Recently, research on topics such as integrating innovative production techniques like 3D printing has increased, yielding promising results for addressing quality control, labor-intensive processes, and characteristic weaknesses. The thesis aims to reassess the role of earthen structures and materials in Turkey, considering current technologies and opportunities. This will be achieved by integrating global literature with Turkey-specific processes. The objective is to identify the barriers hindering the widespread use of earth materials and structures, as well as the factors that can promote their adoption. This thesis first provides a snapshot of this niche sector, with a particular emphasis on a small number of instances gathered through an online survey distributed to professionals in the field, utilizing a geographical mapping approach to identify contemporary earthen structures. Second, through the analysis of traditional and modern earthen techniques and the qualitative analysis of data obtained from semi-structured interviews with field practitioners, the thesis examines the drivers and barriers to the use of these techniques in Turkey. Due to the multi-layered nature of the topic and the context involving innovations, an innovation-focused analytical framework, the Multi-Level Perspective, is used to read and analyze the research findings. The relationships between "The Landscape," "Regime," "Niche," and the socio-technical context as described by this theoretical approach are examined and finally cross analyzed with the existing documentation across the world. By drawing on the reasons that hinder the use of these techniques, a prospective framework on how these techniques would possibly find their place in the upcoming future is provided. The analysis revealed that Turkey being an earthquake zone and the current earthquake regulations are one of the main obstacles to the adoption of this material and techniques, and this situation places Turkey in a completely different position from other countries examined in the literature. In addition, the impact on the current building codes, the lack of standards for testing earth mixtures, the lack of special funds as incentives for earth material practitioners and the lack of courses on these materials in formal learning environments including architecture and civil engineering departments are also highlighted. The thesis only focused on the perspective of niche practitioners; therefore, further research is needed based on the analysis of may benefit from an in-depth study of end-users and policymakers.