India is one of several developing and rapidly urbanizing countries with massive demand for new infrastructure and housing in the coming years. Prefabrication (prefab) and modular construction are poised to provide the most viable solution for the rapid, cost-efficient, and sustainable building necessary to meet this demand.
Prefab is a construction methodology whereby components are fabricated at a production site and transported to the final assembly building site. Prefab brings about faster completion of a project at a lower cost. This is exactly what India needs to meet the requirements of its increasingly urban population.
India’s Infrastructure Needs
It’s estimated that by 2050, India’s urban population will swell by approximately 416 million people. This will require India to build the equivalent of a large city comprising both residential and commercial space each year. Traditional building methods heavily relying on manual labor cannot sustain this building construction level.
However, this is beginning to change with the production of modular prefab buildings. KEF Infra (KEF) leads this development by successfully integrating design, engineering, and fabrication to produce building kits ready to be assembled right out of the box.
Kef Infra – Build it Before You Build it.
KEF Infra One is a prefabrication plant located near the town of Krishnagiri. Here, houses, hospitals, and cafeterias roll off an assembly line with premade furniture and fixtures such as doors, windows, and bathroom components. KEF aims to build in half the time compared to the traditional way of doing things.
The company estimates India will need twenty million homes and three million hospital beds over the next five years. There’s just no way to achieve this without innovations in building practices. Here are some examples of how prefab construction in India aims to meet this massive demand:
- Canteens – KEF’s highest-profile project has been constructing over 400 semipermanent cafeterias (canteens) delivered to Bangalore in 2017. A network of attached kitchens serves the canteens and provides approximately 200,000 people daily with inexpensive meals.
- Schools – Using its prefab and modular techniques, KEF has designed, manufactured, and assembled new schools in just a few weeks. One Indian state has now opened 1,000 government schools produced in this way.
- Homes – KEF is heavily invested in the prefab construction of affordable residential buildings. Amazingly, prefab homes can be assembled on-site in under three hours.
- Hospitals – KEF’s 500-bed hospital in Calicut was built in just eighteen months at a per-bed cost of approximately one-quarter less than for hospital construction in the US.
The Future of Prefabrication
The future of the Indian construction industry belongs to the prefab. KEF is working on its “E Home Project,” whereby people can design and order a home online. Potential homeowners can choose from about fifty designs, including two, three, or four bedrooms and single or double stories. KEF demonstrates that India’s dire need for rapid deployment and assembly of buildings can be met with prefab techniques.
