FUME CUBE, P.2

The company is also working to integrate a heating element into the Fume Cube. Heat is another way to kill bedbugs, and if heat is used instead of sulfuryl fluoride, the Cube could be set up in an inside space, such as in a basement. Maintaining a temperature of 122 degrees for at least an hour can kill bugs and eggs. "The idea would be that nothing would come into the building before it was treated with four hours of heat," he says.

Purchasing a Fume Cube would cost between $7,500 and $15,000 depending on the size and model chosen, but those costs can seem less onerous when compared with repeated visits by exterminators to get lingering bugs. A Fume Cube-treated building also gets a discount of between 25 and 40 percent off fumigation costs every time the Cube must be gassed.

Ultimately, choosing a fumigation method is not a board's greatest challenge, says Bensilber: "The biggest part of the bedbug problem is resident denial," he observes. "If the tenant or shareholder would contact the managing company or the super at an early stage, it can be dealt with. The problem is when you have people who don't want to admit they have issues and then it gets out of control. Most bedbug problems can be solved. It just depends on resident cooperation."

From the January 2012 issue of Habitat magazine. For print-magazine articles back to 2002, join our Archive >>