Drinking alcohol the night before physical labor or exercise in hot conditions of Texas, California, Florida and in the Middle East may increase inflammation in the body and raise the risk of heat-related illness, according to research presented at the 2026 American Physiology Summit in Minneapolis, the flagship meeting of the American Physiological Society.

Related: 10 alcohol-free drinks for the summer – mocktails

This is especially relevant for outdoor workers in roofing, paving, hardscaping, pool installation, and residential construction exposed to extreme heat.

Working or exercising in heat already triggers inflammation as part of a normal stress response. But excessive inflammation can contribute to heat illness. Alcohol can further elevate inflammation, especially darker alcoholic drinks such as whiskey, tequila and red wine, and through acetaldehyde, a toxic byproduct created when the body metabolizes alcohol. Alcohol may also irritate the gut, allowing bacteria to enter the bloodstream and activate an immune response — a concern for construction crews, landscape contractors, and tradespeople working long hours outdoors.

Elevated inflammation can strain the heart by making it work harder in heat, impairing blood vessel function, and increasing the risk of heat exhaustion or heat stroke.

Related: why Muslims don’t drink alcohol

While a cold beer is the first thing you will want after a day in the sun — whether roofing, laying down pavers, building decks or installing backyard pools — what happens when alcohol and heat exposure are combined is less clear. Previous research suggests around 30% of construction workers report working with hangover symptoms at least once a month. Alcohol-related inflammation is typically temporary, but its interaction with heat stress is still being studied.

Summit Sisters at work on a roof in Canada

In two trials, volunteers walked on a treadmill for four hours, simulating half a workday, in a hot room (100°F with 40% humidity). In one session, participants consumed about eight standard drinks the night before (reaching a blood alcohol level of 0.11), while in the other they abstained. Blood samples taken after exercise showed higher levels of inflammatory markers following alcohol consumption.

“These findings suggest that drinking alcohol the night before prolonged physical work in the heat may amplify parts of the body’s inflammatory response,” said Jonathan Specht, PhD, the study’s corresponding author. “Those exerting themselves after drinking should take extra precautions, including hydration, rest and seeking shade.”

The take home? Be mindful about alcohol consumption. Cancer studies have found that no amount is safe, and if you are hard-working and in the sun, don’t drink heavily the night before. Your heart health may depend on it.

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Wind turbines need to be built high to be effective but this makes them a magnet for lightning which can be disastrous –– and nothing a modern lightning rod has been able to solve. While some damaged wind turbines can be upcycled into glorious tiny homes (yes, we’d be happy to review a sample!), investors in turbine projects expect a return on investment.

Lightning strike on an unprotected wind turbine blade can raise its temperature to as high as 54,000° F (30,000° C), and result in an explosive expansion of the air within the blade. This expansion can cause delamination, damage to the blade surface, melted glue, and cracking on blade.

A team from Korea has developed the world’s first technology to prevent damage caused by “positive lightning,” which frequently occurs in offshore wind farms during winter.

Just as voltage has positive and negative poles, lightning also has positive and negative polarities. When clouds carry a positive charge and the ground carries a negative charge, positive polarity lightning strikes, while the opposite case results in negative polarity lightning.

About 90% of the lightning strikes that occur are negative polarity lightning, while positive polarity lightning occurs with a relatively low probability. However, positive polarity lightning has a much higher current intensity, increasing the likelihood of causing major accidents.

Additionally, positive polarity lightning primarily occurs in winter when the altitude of clouds is lower.

With the recent increase in demand for renewable energy, the construction of wind turbines has also been on the rise. In particular, in South Korea, there is a growing trend of large wind turbines specialized for low wind speed environments being moved offshore. However, offshore wind farms are highly vulnerable to lightning strikes from thunderclouds because the turbines are tall and there are few other structures around.

Damage to the blades (rotors) caused by such lightning strikes can lead to the shutdown of wind turbines, resulting in significant losses, including repair costs.

KERI’s achievement is the development of a new edge receptor to protect wind turbine blades from positive lightning.

Currently, wind turbine blades are equipped with an air-termination system, a type of lightning rod that attracts lightning strikes to minimize damage. However, this system has low protection efficiency against positive lightning. Positive polarity lightning has a highly irregular pattern and a much higher current, requiring more advanced technology for effective protection.

Researcher Woo Jeong-min’s team conducted in-depth research on various polarities and conditions, and thoroughly analyzed the effects of the blade’s rotation angle and material. As a result the team found that, unlike negative polarity lightning, positive polarity lightning strikes the side edges of the blade, bypassing the air-termination at the tip and causing damage.

This happens because the positive charge in the air accumulates near the air-termination, and the positive polarity lightning, having the same charge, avoids it and strikes the middle part of the blade, which carries a negative charge.

The research team created a scaled-down model to thoroughly analyze the blades affected in these specific lightning vulnerability areas, and repeatedly conducted artificial lightning experiments using high-resolution cameras to accumulate data. They also used precision measurement systems and simulation technologies to replicate various blade rotation angles and environmental conditions during the experiments.

Through this, the research team was able to design a new edge receptor that optimally positions the air-termination along the side edges of the blade. They confirmed that this method can control the charge distribution of positive polarity lightning, minimizing the damage.

 

“With our technology, we will greatly contribute to improving the stability and efficiency of wind turbines, promoting the expansion of renewable energy, and ultimately have a positive impact on reducing electricity bills for consumers,” says Jeong-min

The results of this study are published in Results in Engineering.

 

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At least 196 sites in Idlib and Aleppo, Syria reportedly sustained damage, with many roads leading to the camps cut off by heavy rains reported the United Nations in a humanitarian bulletin. At least 67,600 have reportedly been affected, and more than 3,760 tents destroyed, with over 7,720 damaged. 

“Thousands of people have been temporarily relocated, many requiring shelter, food, and non-food item support immediately, and in the long term”, the UN’s Humanitarian Affairs Office (OCHA) reported, underscoring the need for more sustainably-designed temporary shelter which may last longer than humanitarian development offices may plan for. 

Passive cooling for Syria’s beehive houses

Taking cues from the tiny home movement, we are sure colleges and design schools around the world, along with architects, can start planning some better solutions for temporary shelter for the world’s displaced – millions from the civil war with Syria, and millions more who end up in countries like Greece from Africa, seeking refuge or maybe just a better life. 

We’ve featured here 10 of the best refugee shelters as a starting point. Take our cues as a way to start designing shelter that may need to last at least a decade. Consider the elements, the weather, the environment and how low impact but long lasting shelters can be made, or even roll away after the displaced start to find more permanent conditions.

10 refugee shelters we hate to love

“The rain and low temperatures highlight the continued need for fuel and heating, winter clothes, blankets, food, livelihoods, and water, sanitation and hygiene,” the United Nations group has said. 

Without sufficient “winterization” – preparing shelters and camps to withstand the harsh conditions and keep occupants warm – people in need could resort to negative coping mechanisms, such as burning unsafe materials for heat, raising the risk of fire outbreaks and toxic fumes. 

The likelihood of accidental fires is increased by challenges in accessing safe fuels, as a result of scarcity and high prices of fuel as well as the general economic deterioration in northwest Syria, it added. Consider the Israeli company Homebiogas which makes clean cooking fuel from kitchen waste and human excrement. It’s a no brainer. We have all the solutions out there. Some motivated person needs to connect the dots. 

In the past month in Syria, some 17 fire incidents were reported that affected 28 households, destroyed 28 tents, resulting in one death and seven injuries. This is from fires and unsafe cooking. 

Meanwhile, ongoing fighting in the region continues to take a toll on civilians, especially near near the M4 and M5 highways – two key arteries linking the capital Damascus with Aleppo city and much of northern Syria. I travelled through Syria and the world is pretty bleak along these highways.  

A number of civilian casualties – including children – have been reported due to artillery shelling or improvised explosive devices or unexploded ordinances. Some incidents occurred in residential areas or at local markets, raising risk for civilians. 

 

Continued hostilities in Syria, new and protracted displacement and a sustained erosion of communities’ resilience after a decade of conflict, has left millions in desperate need of assistance. 

Across Syria, an estimated 13 million people – over 70 per cent of the population – are expected to require aid in 2021. The UN estimates that 10.5 million people will be targeted with humanitarian assistance through the year at a cost of $4.2 billion, which is a 10 per cent increase compared to 2020. With Covid we can expect everything to become worse. 

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Collaboration between business, law and design students from one of the world’s top universities is producing tiny houses that could revolutionize how we approach holidays, and green up tourism too. This summer, the Millennial Housing Lab launched Getaway, a rental concept for micro-homes for the millennial marketplace.

Harvard Business School student Jon Staff has racked up a resume of non-traditional living. He’s lived on a boat, in a frozen yogurt shop basement, a 26-foot-long Airstream trailer, and even did a stint of sleepovers in a Harvard library.  No surprise that he was naturally drawn to the tiny house movement – a growing trend that advocates simply living in small spaces.

Last year, Staff co-founded the Millennial Housing Lab, an action lab composed of Harvard business, law and design school students with a mission to develop new housing ideas bespoke to the millennial generation (people born between the 1980s and early 2000s).

Through its blog, email bulletins, and special events, the project also aims to incite vibrant conversation about millennial housing, and catalyze change in the residential building industry. Its wider goal is to incubate and launch new design-, business- and regulatory-related housing concepts. (Consider the build-your-own (anywhere!) WikiHouse we reported on last year!)

Tiny homes are everywhere.  Photogenic and adorable, who hasn’t been curious what they’re like in 3-D? The differentiator with Getaway homes is that these micro-buildings are rentable. Situated on beautiful rural landscapes, they can be used as a hotel by city folks looking to escape for a digital detox, a bonding weekend with friends, a romantic anniversary, or a meditative retreat.

“Test driving” one with no long-term commitment might encourage users to adopt tiny-home practices in their regular lives.

Jon Staff and Pete Davis founded The Millennial Housing Lab, and designed the Getaway with Addison Godine, Wyatt Komarin, and Rachel Moranis. Go to the Getaway House website for more details on pricing and availability.

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Artist Gregory Kloehn veered off course from a career creating large-scale sculptures, focusing his talents on making tiny buildings from garbage. He erects one-room houses to hotel the homeless, dumpster diving for raw materials which he reassembles into inventive (and minuscule) mobile homes.

This is where upcycling is perfect to help those who don’t have money to shop or buy a home of their own.

The little structures are built on a base about the size of a mattress, usually made from old wood shipping pallets and topped with a pitched roof to divert rain (Kloehn works in the famously moist Bay area of Oakland, California – but these shelters can be used everywhere).

He also buys and adds wheels, so new owners can easily relocate when needed.

He first set out to build tiny homes with materials sourced from illegal dump sites, with an intention to sell them.

Story goes that one day, a homeless man came by his studio asking for a tarp to use as shelter. He couldn’t afford to buy his own.

Kloehn – who was working on a small wood frame (equipped with a rudimentary kitchen, water tank and small trap for human waste) – realized it could act as an actual “house” for this man, a customized and securable space in which to live.

Kloehn is not homeless, although he lives in a similar structure while vacationing in New York; this guy knows small-house living. Each new design is inspired in part by the changing inventory of materials at hand.

Unlike his sculptural works, these creations are being used.  His houses change lives.

California has the largest homeless population in America. Kloehn can’t solve the problem, his inexpensive solution can help.

He’s also attracting media attention and donations and a small army of volunteers. Reach out to him via his Facebook page if you would like additional info (link here). If you are a dumpster diver, who likes to salvage perfectly great items that other people shop for, online or in stores, start up a project like this for homeless near you.

His housing recipe can be replicated most everywhere on the planet.  Here in Jordan, I’ve seen small NGOs sweat blood to raise funds for metal cabins (similarly sized to Kloehn’s houses), then bend in pretzel twists to get them cleared through Customs for delivery – an arduous process that chews up time and more cash.

Jordan is a mecca for illegal dumping.  Perhaps an Amman architectural school could replicate this project as a for-credit design studio class? For minimal investment, corporate sponsors could step up to host a city-wide design competition. Involve international schools with established community service programs. Team up with Habitat for Humanity.

Participants could clear dumpsites AND create useful shelter for refugees or local roadside tent communities; it’s so easy to think outside the box in this zip code so rich in improper waste disposal and human need.

Kloehn doesn’t plan to stop building. He’s thinking about teaching others how to make them – starting classes.

“A lot of people who hear about what I’m doing want to get involved,” he told Viral Nova. “Maybe we meet someplace and put a couple homes together.”

It’s brilliant. If more people could learn how to create these tiny homes for others, the impact is enormous.  Incite creativity, clean up trash heaps, and change lives.

All images from Gregory Kloehn 

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Ten miles from Mexico, nestled in a humid valley in Arizona we arrive in Canelo for a straw bale building workshop. This is a place where 11-year olds drive, breakfast with songstress Linda Ronstadt is not uncommon, and people from all walks of life share a common ground.

The workshop hosts, Bill and Athena Steen are natural building gurus who call their non-profit organization The Canelo Project. They have helped thousands of people locally and around the world build sustainable homes from a low-cost, readily available material: straw bales.

Athena was raised in a New Mexico Pueblo Indian family and witnessed her family building their home from adobe. Bill has been photographing and writing books on alternative buildings for many years. With his small, pantless son Kalin balancing off his hip, Bill tosses me a delicious quesadilla and talks about how peaceful his homestead is:

“Here, [in Canelo] there are several small buildings in various stages that allow you to see, touch and experience many of the materials and techniques that we teach. You will leave inspired – empowered with new possibilities and skills.”

Throughout the week we learned about the advantages of straw bale for the outside environment and the human body.

Strawbale houses hurricane resilient

Contrary to the ‘Little Pigs’ fairytale, buildings made with straw bales are unusually strong and sturdy. Bill says that when a hurricane ravished a barrio in Sonoro, Mexico the only buildings left standing were the ones made of bales.

Straw Bale homes are perfect for places with hot summers and cold winters. The thickness of the walls and the large overhang of a typical straw bale home make the interior cool in the hottest days of summer and warm in the coolest days of winter.

When heating the home, many families attest that a small wood stove is enough for heating the entire home, even in cooler climates, like Canada. So, energy savings by building with straw bale can save heaps of cash in the long run.

“We explore ways of living that connect us to others and the natural world,” says Bill. “Athena and I seek to balance the wisdom and skills of the past with those things which have value today. We combine our efforts with others to create simple, comfortable shelter using local and natural materials with handcrafted care.”

Straw bale homes breathe. Contrary to modern homes built with, bricks, stone and drywall, the straw bale home is alive. Air can pass through the earthen plaster, through the straw, through another layer of earthen plaster to you. As the materials you build with are usually natural and best if local, i.e. no artificial additives to the paints, sealers, insulation, you and your family can breathe toxin-free air.

You can also do it yourself. With basic knowledge on building, gathered from a workshop, books, and the Internet you and yours can put a straw bale home together in no time. You can create niches and rooms that softly embrace you.

The late alternative builder Nader Khalili from California via Iran calls his sleeping enclaves ‘bedwombs.’ Made to nurture the human psyche, the caverns are soft and organic (like people), without modern sharp, square edges.

Straw bale buildings are beautiful. Living inside these spaces can dramatically affect your quality of life. Imagine the difference between living in a home with natural walls that breathe as opposed to being surrounded by cement.

Straw bale homes are low cost

Straw bale homes can be built with less than half the money of traditional homes. There are even those who manage with a few thousand dollars. See testimonials in Bill and Athena’s book “The Beauty of Straw Bale Homes.” Because straw bale building is a ‘new’ concept, homebuilders can host onsite wall raisings where participants will pay to learn more from the hosts.

“Many facets of designing and building a straw bale home are similar to that of building a conventional house,” comments Athena.

“Developing small and efficient straw bale buildings that are well matched to their climate and context and maintain a level of comfort through passive conditioning is a strong focus of our workshop. As are simple and sensible methods and skills that allow for the artistic creation of a uniquely personal and handcrafted home.”

Sounds good. So what are the drawbacks?

Building that suits space and the desert

Straw bale walls are thick. The homeowner can lose considerable floor space or property. For this reason, it is more practical to build in the countryside than in the city, especially in Israel where urban land is scarce.

Another issue to consider is moisture retention. If not properly sealed and maintained, the straw bale home can rot. It is important to maintain the walls and ensure roof overhangs are large enough to prevent moisture buildup. Even in places like Amsterdam and Montreal, healthy happy straw bale homes and institutes are housing people during persistent rain and extreme temperatures and snow. So, it can be done.

In Canelo, we wake every morning to a serene desert landscape, sparse shrub brush and cottonwoods dancing across the meadows.

At an elevation of 1500 meters, altitude and plenty of trees and grasses buffer the usual Arizona heat and dryness. There is a disproportionately large population of frolicking deer. The home-schooled children meld with the landscape and the barefoot boys are by far the best-adjusted and mature kids I’ve ever met. Each day I take a walk with the eldest son, Benito. We discuss philosophy and colors.

The participants come from all walks of life – there were two Christian missionaries working in non-profit organizations, a talent agent from Hollywood, a real estate agent who wanted to sell homes she felt good about, a potter, a carpenter, an ex-advertising agent, a Mennonite parson…all of them had a common dream – to build homes they feel good about.

For more information about building with natural materials, check out the Steen’s website at www.caneloproject.com

More sustainable architecture:

Nader Khalili’s superadobe homes fit for space

Plantware: Fantasies About Building Homes From Living Trees

Want to Start Your Own Desert Commune

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