Dive summary:

• A new technology, geopiers, allows contractors to create a solid building base in loose soils.
• Geopiers are akin to conventional piers, but are constructed with crushed rock rather than by pounding in piles.
• Rock is rammed into a hole bored to the needed depth and required diameter, and Alabama contractor Stewart Perry Co. recently was able to install 140 geopiers in a few days.

From the article:

There are no complicated steel or concrete connections, only conventional spread footings on top of the geopier, hence the name “intermediate foundation systems.” ...