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Affordability for Product Innovators and Researchers
Product innovators and researchers want to ensure that there is a need and a market for the new products or processes they develop for homes. This does not necessarily mean that a new technology will immediately cost less compared to other equivalent technologies or substitutions. The savings may be in long-term cost, reduction of destructive environmental impact, or greater long-term durability and resistance to disaster. PATH believes that new research and product development must include an understanding of the deeper needs of housing-some of which are not always immediately the most affordable.
For this reason, PATH looks at how production of certain technologies, especially those in the Technology Inventory, affect manufacturing costs. Part of the process is to develop quantifiable measurements of production costs for the long and short terms, which provide manufacturers with affordability benchmarks they can use to compare old and new technologies.
PATH also knows that one of the biggest challenges in producing new housing technologies is basic investment in research and development efforts. For that reason, PATH has grant mechanisms for Background Research and Technology Development.
Content updated on 10/29/2004