Cohousing-L Mailing List: Strawbale Construction More

[Harry Pasternak (Harry_Pasternak]

This note is a continuation of my suggestion that folks read and do other
research before they consider building with "strawbale construction methods".
Over the last 38 years, I seen too many people end up as guineau pigs,
because they jumped on the bandwagon of some "better way" to build; without
do their research, before they started to build. 

By the way, I was not the person who decided to use the term "con" in this
discussion, I believe Tom can take credit for that. 
Here is more information that came from a telephone duscussion with Suzanne
at the StrawBale Builders Assoc (505) 989-4400:

On The Cost of Construction, Suzanne said:
- That the walls of a house only comprise 10-14% of the cost of building a
home.
- That the cost of "Strawbale" wall construction will be HIGHER than
conventional construction when done by a contractor who is just starting out
in "Strawbale" wall construction. 
- That the cost of "Strawbale" wall construction will be slightly lower than
conventional construction when done by a contractor who is experienced in
"Strawbale" wall construction. (again note that the walls only represent
10-14% of the cost of the home-if you save 15% on the walls ( that only cost
10% of total cost), that would only would be a percent or so on the entire
cost of construction-is it worth it)?

On The Environmental Impact of Strawbale, Suzanne says that:
- There is an Embodied Cost in the strawbales-and that no one as yet has
studied these embodied costs (so goes the notion of the strawbales are
inherently better than other methods of building walls when it comes to
environmental impact).

On R Value of Strawbale Walls, Suzanne said:
- Sandia National Labs' R.V. Acton carried out testing, but wasn't sure which
Standard was used, or if age tesing was part of the standard (I will contact
Acton and  post the info).

Lastly, David Eisenberg's comment is noteworthy:
" There are also many things that we don't yet know about straw bale
construction.  There are research and testing projects being carried out to
find some of the answers and there is much more to be done." Building an
entire neighborhood is enough of a challenge as it is-why make it more
complicated?

Harry Pasternak
Unpaid Volunteer For D.I.Y.'s Who Need Info On Designing and Building 
Affordable,Frugal Supportive Neighborhoods, Who Works At:
Thousand Islands Institute
The Independent Centre For Housing Research & Education
(Harry_Pasternak [at] tvo.org) 
 

- sent via an evaluation copy of BulkRate (unregistered).