He said that tornadoes were their greatest fear, followed by fire and earthquakes. R eferring to existing schools, Floyd said that indoor air quality must be improved, since many of Arkansas facilities suffered from sick building syndrome, usually caused by leaking roofs, that lead to rot, mold, and eventually sick children. Arkansas State Representative Mike Hathorn and Speaker of the House Bob Johnson said that they wanted Arkansas to be first in the construction of public school buildings safe from natural and nuclear disaster. When Hector s elementary school principal asked U.S. Department of Energy, Senior Financial Specialist Ward Huffman what their priorities should be, Huffman said that they should buy the dome first because it offered the most energy savings, then use geothermal heating and cooling, and use solar if they can get a grant. That meeting solidified Hector s determination to go Monolithic.
Potential dangers are a tornado, earthquake and nuclear mishap.
The domes will serve as our disaster shelters. Our local emergency services fire and police have our complete cooperation. We have to save money on our heating and cooling, Thompson said. We wanted to use a fuel cell that would let us produce our own electricity, but there are no units made large enough to serve a structure the size of the domes we re planning. We re now considering solar panels and geothermal heating and cooling, which costs more to install but saves money in the long run.