What do you think about prefabricated straw bale panels? Are there any other alternative construction methods you'd like me to review? Visit brilliant.org/BelindaCarr/ to get started learning STEM for free, and the first 200 people will get 20% off their annual premium subscription.
TY! About 1/5 of US from I35 in Texas to East cost has high humidity and may or may not be suitable. Idk. Is there a way to build using straw in high humid areas?
Not as common, though prefab cistern designs seems feasible and possibly cost effective though maybe more for underground homes, homes buried once footed/finished or root cellars which for now might not be as common as have been. I also wonder if anyone used the reefer trailers since seems like a better option than intermodal shipping containers due to being insulated already. Great videos as always! Thanks for sharing.
FYI - because of a lack of housing around Sinclair Wyoming at the refinery there during a shutdown a group of 4 construction workers took my idea (I was always reading about alternative housing. That made 5 of us) and the week before the job we leased a 1/2 acre from a rancher and built an octagonal straw bale house that was 30 feet across flat to flat outside dimension. A 6 inch post at each corner of the octagon and a center post for supporting the roof. We built a wood deck slightly off the ground and stacked bales between the corner posts. One flat had the exterior door and the other flats had window boxes built that were 18" deep with a single cheap aluminum frame window on each side so it was "sorta double paned" (we ended up growing herbs and stuff in them). So as the bales were stacked, a window box was substituted for a bale. Note that we used black visqeen plastic to set the bales on and when a wall segment was done we brought it up on the outside and inside to the top and stapled it to the cross beams going from corner post to corner post to encapsulate it for water proofing and air sealing. We then put 20 foot rafters going from the higher center post out to the octagon wall sections. We 1/2" plywood decked and tar papered the roof, then decided to put a layer of visqeen on top of that and some slats to hold it all down in the expected high winds we were informed of. Privacy walls of 2x4s were built to make 5 pie shaped (truncated point... For the cheap blanket hanging doorways in the center) bedrooms with the open main living area and kitchen taking up the rest of 3 remaining 'segments'. We got a local built 35 gallon steel barrel wood burning stove for heat and ran the vent chimney up through the roof. We stayed there for 4 months (and it snowed and blew quite a bit) and it was quite nice and didn't take much to heat. When we left we figured the rancher would just burn it down or something because he said just leave it, he'd take care of it. Note that the entire cost to build it was less than $500 back then, so individually it was $100. Since we were all getting per diem we made out like bandits! TWENTY-FOUR YEARS LATER I ended back up in Wyoming and drove my wife and kids there to show where I'd built the hay bale house and was surprised to see it was still there. Electricity had been brought in and the exterior was stucco and it now had a metal roof. Pretty good for a temporary shelter for "migrant" industrial construction workers, haha.
@@KvltKommando well it's 1406 miles away from where I now live according to Google Maps and I haven't been closer than 700 or 800 miles of there in over a decade so.... No, there's not going to be any pictures. I'd say go look up pictures of a yurt, but make it octagonal instead of round.
We are getting close to having ours done. We are loving it. If I had a dollar for every time someone asked me is it going to get blown down by a wolf. Lol also people seem to think it’s going to burn down. Regular wood houses are much more likely to burn than a strawbale house ❤😊 Great video!
Always a fan of the alternative construction techniques. Your critical review from an industry standard perspective only helps to increase their visibility and reduce the barriers to entry for more people to adopt them.
The reason alternative construction techniques are not mainstream is because they come with more problems, and end up being more expensive than traditional building.
Thank you for a solid and honest overview of straw bale building. And yes, I would be hesitant to build one in a humid climate, too. My spouse and I designed & built a large 4000 sq/ft straw bale home we happily lived in for 14 years (until we had to move), and it was one of the best decisions we ever made. It was about 10% more expensive to build compared to traditional homes due to the more labour-intensive process, but the incredible insulation values meant that the cost of heating & cooling the place was minimal, offsetting the extra building cost within 3-4 years. We lived in an area with 37C/100F summers and -35C/-31F winters, and the house was never too hot or too cold. A smart passive solar design, open concept and lots of thermal pass was a big part of that, too. One thing about prefab straw bale walls, though: the flatbed trailer transporting those bulky walls to your site very quickly increases the home's carbon footprint...
I grew up in central Texas. I remember the old homes with 13” thick limestone walls and deep overhanging roofs. Those thick walls were a great choice because they insulated the home. I also love the deep overhangs. So much light and yet it helped save energy passively. Do love to have a home with these features today.
Actually stone provides no insulation, it is thermal mass. It will slow the transfer of thermal energy but acts like a big battery for heat or cold, reradiating it out over time. It’s a buffer, not a barrier.
Straw is not a "waste product", at least not on the farm I grew up on. Straw has TONS of on farm uses, bedding for animals, mulch for everything, ground cover, manure composting, and that's just the simplest most obvious ones. Ya, not a waste product by any means. Now that we have that out of way. You can use earth plaster on straw bale construction, as long as you have enough overhang to prevent direct rain. This makes straw bale construction not only low cost, but also possible to made entirely from local products, and I mean stuff found immediately around the house site. I also think that learning the skill involved in plastering earth plaster can be easily learned in a few hours of practice, which you can do while plastering your home. Bonus, even if you do a rubbish job at first, you can easily go back and repair your work as you get better at doing it. IF you live where you have suitable earth, and readily available straw bales, I"m pretty sure that an analysis would show that straw bales are an excellent and affordable choice. And truly very sustainable.
people waste things all the time. That doesn’t mean that the product is waste, it just means that the product was wasted. Our society wastes a lot of resources simply because we think of them as “waste”, rather than looking into the value that is in the product. Sewage is a prime example. Human sewage can be used to generate electricity to run our homes and vehicles. It can be used to create highly valuable fertilizer, and so much more.
@@allenwc I believe everyone here agrees in its potential uses. Doesn't change the fact that as we stand today much is burned and wasted - I think we're all on the same team in trying to repurpose those burned.
Great summary of strawbale construction Belinda! I love the idea and possibility of the prefab strawbale walls. We have lived in our Timberframe home with strawbale infill for 14.5 years now here on a small island on the southwest coast of Canada. The timber came from the property, island and neighbouring island. The home was built in the method of “workshop” for much of the building process. We still have people who come up to us and say what part of the house they worked on and what they did. There are some interior packed clay walls and one section of an exterior wall as well. The building has wide overhangs and wood on the south exposure side with the big windows that gets the most impact tour west coast winter storms. Many skylights on the metal roof keep the home bright and cheerful in any season. All the pros and cons mentioned in the video fit our experience of living in our strawbale timberframe home except for bug and rodents. These have not been an issue. The lime plaster walls are sealed and nothing comes in unless we leave a door open. We treat treat the home perimeter yearly against carpenter ants which because living in the woods is something everyone should do. Cornfield ants sometimes like to live under the cement pad of the home and can get confused and come into the house when they are leaving the nest but this isn’t because of the strawbale walls. So no concern with bugs and definitely not rodents in the house. Our lime plaster both exterior and interior has stood up extremely well and I am just this year starting to apply fresh milk paint to the inside walls. What we really love about our home though is how it quiet and breathes and how it is cool in the summer and warm in the winter. It is a sanctuary. We have in-floor hot water electric heat and a gas fireplace as back up for our many power outages during the winter. The home is modest at 1,200 square feet with high cathedral ceilings and surrounded by woods. If we ever have to move, this is a home we will be deeply miss. Ordinary homes just don’t measure up to this home. It seems to love us back in the way it wraps around us like a warm hug. Here is a link to my blog with some photos from about 12 years ago. The place has changed some since then as we added another main floor bedroom with wet room ensuite where the front deck use to be for aging in place: creativepotager.com/la-casa-de-inspiracion/
Bamboo would be an interesting building material, that would complement this. Sustainable and quick growing. Any chance of making an episode on this in the future? Thank you.
Amazing to see the Asians using Bamboo for their actual structures design in more than one story... even India I suppose I've seen for scaffolding very high multistory when making RC structures.
As someone who is dreaming of strawbale home for a long time, this video was exactly what I needed. I am especially grateful for the "disadvantages" section which showed me some things I was not aware of. Nicely done!
I've loved the straw bail technique for over 45 years.... even more so now when wood has become so expensive and the insulating factors are phenomenal. In Calaveras county there is a straw bail house there that's 150 yrs old.
I visited a few strawbale homes over the years as well as other non-conventional building material homes. Those with strawbale homes always seem happy to build with the same material again. Not so with other materials, mud brick, rammed earth etc. Yes great content as always. Cheers from Oz
More episodes on straw bale and prefab walls with straw bale technology would be useful. Cross-over concepts of building straw bale barndominiums and tiny houses could be interesting and useful. Rapid resolution of permitting hurdles is an important topic too.
Sooo glad you are a convert! Personally, when I was looking at what resale of strawbales would be , I found they sold almost soon as they came on the market and sell at high prices. I don't think bugs are a real problem as highly compressed and sealed unlike stick built homes that are very gap ridden. Hand done home can have rounded corners, window seats and be very whimsically hand plastered. There was a whole thing prepandemic where an expert comes and oversees the construction of eager to learn people doing free labor and then people who had been to a couple of these invited more people to come learn for free labor. I don't know that I love the panels that much... do they have the same wind/ fire resistance? Found the website and they are only easily had in Europe and am weighing osb with covering vs plastering or concrete spray that keys into the bales for durability. looked at the price of the one bedroom tiny house and wow. Most strawbales in the book I bought were done for about $30 sq ft.
I have also read that condensation points can be an additional concern in colder climates, where the insulative properties of straw bales make them more desirable. In the cold winters, something like steel can attract moisture to condense inside the straw bale and cause rot. I'm not an expert on this topic though. I'm simply an enthusiastic bystander eager to see straw and hemp become more prevalent in modern construction. I think these type of structures are so beautiful! I love the thick walls, and the natural plasters. Everything about them look so...smooth!
Thank you so much for tackling strawbale homes 🏡 I have studied all kinds of building techniques, and besides being practical, healthy and possibly cheaper, I love the aesthetic of thick window sills and plaster walls ♡
Those thick walls do have one advantage that makes them well-suited for building in the desert. It means that windows have built-in shading which means you get light without as much undesirable heat gain. Stick-built homes tend to omit shading on windows. One of my favorite straw-bale homes is in the desert of southern Utah. If I'm remembering correctly, it's about two decades old at this point and it's timber frame (i.e. the straw isn't loadbearing). One of the unique features of this house is the indoor lap pool, surrounded by windows along the south side of the house. It acts as a thermal and hygric buffer for the rest of the house. (it's kind of like an earthship in that way.)
There was a show on several years ago about a family building a straw bale house in California. He went around the country looking at different "green" ways to build. They went to a straw bale house on the east coast that was over 200 years old. Wish I could remember what the program was
Straw bail homes are a great idea, but super extra care must be take during the construction process. As a fire fighter I was present at a structure fire on a home the had a room in attic type detached garage under construction using the straw bales. The stucco had not been applied when we were there, the mobile home had a fire under the floor that was self vented out the side of the structure. Upon arrival the only thing other than the home in danger was the LP tank. We entered the home and started cooling the LP tank, within minutes of this starting the hot ash started the gable end wall on fire, in less than 5 minutes the roof was on the ground. During the build you are creating a fantastic fire environment, vertical stacks of straw. A simple spark off the saw could result in starting over or someone's life.
Prefub panel houses seem to be a sensible idea in aridish areas, closer to equator or countries like Turkey. Any area with high humidity or big seasonal temperature change is a big nono it seems. Good video, Belinda! Thanks for this info!
It depends on whether the water is going to condense or not. So humidity alone will not be the problem but when combined with conditions that can lead to it. Humid interiors in cold climates for example could lead to problems. However it should also be noted that straw bales can take on an expire vapour, mitigating humid conditions. Something else to consider, wherever you use wood you can also use straw otherwise you'd be having problems with the wood structure as well. I believe John Straube has done research on the vapour storage capacity of straw.
If I ever thought I would be able to build my own home, this channel would be my first resource for building. I remember seeing straw homes on a home improvement show on PBS decades ago, and was quite intrigued. I think the prefab panels make far more sense.
A builder near me built several load bearing straw bale houses for clients in the 1980's-90's. When he wanted to build one for his own family the banks and insurance companies put a stop to his plans. I've talked to the people who live in one of those houses and they say rodents are the biggest negative even though the bales were treated with a rodenticide before construction. Someone else I know built a similar house using baled cardboard instead of straw. He ran the cardboard baler at a large catalog company distribution warehouse. When he learned how much the company was paying to dispose of the bales he made a deal with them to take some for free.The walls of his house are 30 inches thick.
We’ve near had rodents in our Strawbale we used stucco and not earth in plaster. Friends of are’s have had a lot of issues with there earth in plaster Strawbale.
@@backtoasimplelife Stucco expands and contracts with temperature changes. That causes cracks to form and mice can get through those cracks into the straw bales. For a mouse it's a great place to raise a litter.
BELINDA!!! 😁😁😁 thanks for making a concise pros and cons video on this type of construction! I will admit that I was a bit worried that your trained eye would have found a fatal flaw in this building technique that I (as a laymen) hadn’t recognized or come across, and to my relief you didn’t! I’ve been wanting to build a straw bale house for a while now, but I’m quite happy in my mid ‘50s ranch style house… so I’ll just continue to daydream about straw bales!
Noi costruiamo case in paglia in Italia e ne siamo orgogliosi come i nostri committenti. Grazie per diffondere questa tecnica costruttiva! We build thatched houses in Italy and we are as proud of it as our clients. Thank you for spreading this construction technique!
I discovered this channel only today and I have been binge watching the videos already. Kindly do more and more alternative construction videos. If possible, do make a video where max floors that can be constructed using all eco friendly Material from walls to foundation and the roof as well.
I love the nicely presented, wholisically considered and thoroghly distilled presentation of your collection of straw bale construction. As a person who is very passionate about alternative building products, this episode was very informative and entertaining from beginning to end.
I've recently started following your channel and I'm impressed by the amount of research per video - informative and easy to digest. I'd wish for more topics regarding buildings that are made out of concrete in other countries, though. Maybe... how to soundproof a concrete house that doesn't have any studs?
Thanks Belinda, I've been interested in straw bale construction for some time.. very good video and def hope you do more on this subject... it really is the way of our future since lumber is so expensive now..
I've wondered if there is a method to seal the straw bales using some sort of polyurethane spray coating or like maybe even wrapping with sheets of thermoplastic like PET or other long lasting recyclable material where a vacuum can be applied for further potential insulating effects. Amazing how thatch and cob were more common at times in parts of the World. Sad the lack of regenerative and renewable resources use... though is good to see a flow versus ebb economic season main stream. Guessing something malicious wanted to own whatever they could get away with.
I think they have their place - a limitation not often discussed is humidity. If the ambient humidity is too high, they are not suitable. It isn't possible to 100% encapsulate and seal the bales.
My concern about the prefabricated straw bale panels is that their volume makes transportation costs potentially untenable. I'm really enjoying your alternative construction techniques. Thank you for posting.
We were planning on building a straw bale house. And still want to do this! Beside the insulation the instant “character” is the main attraction for us.
Fantastic video. - thank you for your research! We are considering building our new home via ecococon panels in the UK. This really breaks down the pros and cons.
Yes! Yes yes . Yes yes yes yes. Love your content love alternative building techniques. Bring it on. 😆. Earth rammed have you done earthrammed yet can’t remember.
❗️Couple of important points she doesn’t mention is straw is an ANNUAL CROP where as lumber takes 50-100 yrs to grow so far more product over time. Also, the reason why straw is so fire resistant is because it contains cellulose which makes it difficult to burn.
It is unfortunate people do not consider things like appropriate technology for the intended use, climate and energy involved in transporting "sustainable" building materials. I live at 7,000 ft and people here have made fences and buildings out of straw bale. When the bales crack and get water inside them, they rot and disintegrate. They can work in some areas, but if you have extreme humidity swings and extreme temperature swings particularly cold to hot, these are a disaster if not done right
2 года назад
Love straw bale buildings and your videos ! Keep them coming !!!
This was fascinating, thank you! I was wondering whether you might be able to do a similar in-depth look at cob houses? It's a suuuper traditional technique still used by millions of people around the world today, but almost never seen in the West any more despite being the standard method for centuries before timber framing became popular
A great video follow up would be a survey of straw bale projects and the details that make them "straw bale." I.e. most of a straw bale building is just a standard building, like a slab or raised floor & interior partitions, roof framing, roofing, etc. Also the cost per sq.ft. of wall comparison would be educational including the local cost effects (e g. proximity to source, local specialty suppliers...)
It's not possible to build with straw bale in Florida, but out here in the country a straw bale house would be a rat high rise. And then there's the issue of fields lacking organic matter, which makes it require more fertilizer and more water. Selling the wheat straw off the land is selling off half the organic matter the crop generated. Given the fact that erosion is one of the greatest threats to mankind, it's better to leave the straw in the field.
Things i wish you had mentioned: Old quote from the 1960s and 70s... "Good Hat & Good Boots" meaning a proper roof with overhanging eaves designed for each specific location.. and the right foundation for each environment and topography. Attention paid to exterior surfaces to insure continuity (no gaps or thermal breaks). Acoustics deserve special mention! Ask musicians ... and old high fidelity fans. Asthetics are a large factor in long term satisfaction for home owners. When the walls are reserved for doors, windows and sculpted clay...light flows around in an ever changing dance. Closets, cupbords, built-in whatevers and paintings can grace the interior walls. The $$$avings on utilities cannot be emphasized enough. If the passive solar & insulated house eliminates/reduces the outrageously increasing costs of heating and cooling the home ... you will have the freedom to choose ~ what you want~ to do with that money every month, for as long as you live there.
Sorry to run long.... Must add passionate endorsement for clay interior walls... heavenly fresh breathable air! For exterior walls clay, more clay, and a surface/final coat of clay-lime render. Yes.... it is hard work...but so very much worth it! Excellent books abound, as well as videos and building seminars. This might just be the quest of a lifetime resulting in a home for a lifetime.
After hearing about the house in Nebraska, it made me wonder if the three little pigs story was written with the purpose of destroying a straw bail home market. I never would have thought a home built of straw would hold up so well. Every type of construction has its pros and cons. Diversifying the way houses are built. Using the ideal technique/building style, for the climate the house is located. Or buy used, lol.
In major fires Sonoma County, CA the only homes to survive flames at and on the homes were straw bale homes. Many photos. But, NOT straw bale homes that had wood trellis's. These homes also had 4" inset windows. Straw bale walls are 2 feet thick covered in a mixture of Portland Cement, Limestone, and Sand. Mold, fire, insect proof. High thermal mass so low heating and AC bill or non-existent depending on where you live.
I’ve attended a stawbale workshop, and learned a lot. They are very beautiful houses but the technique is limiting in what you can design and everything from foundation to plumbing to electrical becomes much more complicated. The project I attended we had to use underground electrical in the whole house and the foundation alone was over $100k. Since the workshop I’ve been wanting to learn more about hempcrete and exploring a combination of that with a post frame construction.
I am good friends with the folks who created the Ecococon panels. It's quite a leap from straw bail in terms of the quilty and energy performance, it makes straw prefabrication walls quite straightforward on our passive house projects in Colorado.
I am very interested in straw bake oanels, especially the panels with straw and mud compacted together to make it fireproof. I saw some mentioned in a book that were the thickness of dry wall. These would be useful to add behind drywall for remodeling. It would be nice to have loose straw coated with mud to use as a loose insulation material.
I have been in a straw bale hotel for a few days. The room had a very good climate and it was extremely quiet. There was absolutely no sound audible from neighbors.
Most of the downsides of bales are the same as for wood. As they are the same material, cellulose. Just bales don't dry easily once wet, so have to be kept dry. Though longer term the same is true for both. Considering the lumber costs this method should have exploded, but so few understand it. Austin TX has a written code for it. Though I feel it is all constructed slightly wrong which causes the wall height limitations. The walls need some method of staking them together to provide shear resistance (keeping them in a stack). So most put a high strength material though the center of the bale, like rebar or wood stakes. That method doesn't use the strength of that material well. It should be placed on the exterior of the bales and tied together between each course. Then the high strength material is on the outside where it forms a sandwich composite beam. The tying pinches the bales between, providing the shear resistance, but also adds bending resistance that center staking does not. The concrete/lime/plaster takes the compression, and the sandwich material takes the tension. Then building to larger unsupported heights isn't as large an issue and the walls are far stronger. It is also easier to construct as nothing is required to pierce the bales. On the issue on wall hangings, you can place wood strips between the bales at locations you expect to hang things. Particularly cabinets that carry higher loads. They can be installed either horizontal or vertical, and are a rigid connection point once all the plaster surrounds them. Some even leave the outside edge exposed which makes them easy to find.
I was thinking to advice you to take a look at Ecococon. But I was happy to see that you already found them. These prefabricated elements are quite interesting. And the thickness of the walls are similar to what we normally (in newer times) build in Denmark.
Hello Belinda, Thank You So Much for your effort and Vedios. I Follow you from Egypt. I am Architect, and now I am working on my Project depending on Agriculture Waste such as straw and Cotton fabric to manufacturing eco friendly blocks and bricks, Can you tell me other example and other idea for using agriculture waste in building and furniture? Also Can you tell me equations exactly about Mix agriculture waste with Slaked lime? Thank you so much
I heard that regular brick-shaped straw bales are not that easy to find, since more and more machines are making cylindrical ones. I am more interested in straw/light clay, theoretically it could be close to the hempcrete in its characteristics.
i feel like if it's for a farmhouse it'd be ideal since land size isn't that much of an issue, but otherwise, that thickness sounds like a dealbreaker, especially if it can only do 2 floors
I just wanted to say how do you manage to memorize all this? Stuff. Or remember it well probably because you're still young and maybe you just got a good memory. I enjoy your videos. Thank you and keep exploring and giving us the spiritual information. But I did want to mention that regardless of whatever techniques. Are used you know in the end of this system of things? We will build homes that will last forever and we won't have to worry about all those things that we worry about now such as fire mold condensation. Improper heating we will know how to build these things and keep ourselves comfortable and we won't damage the environments❤
The prefabricated panels sound like the most feasible way to incorporate straw into a wider usage. There is less room for error in manufacturing due to being done with machines, and probably also offers the option of including other liners or chemical treatments. I'm sure it will take a lot more trial and error to find the best way to use straw in modern construction though.
I'd add to this that it seems most current techniques are being limited by the conventional form of straw instead of how it could be used/processed. Highly compressed straw panels could have useful applications (mostly eyeing that fire resistance) as drywall or even in a matrix like hemp. Simply stacking bales just seems like minimal effort in application.
@@quintessenceSL Something along the lines of medium density fiberboard made from shredded, compressed, and treated straw? I'm unsure if straw would have similar enough properties to sawdust to be used like that, but it may be worth looking into.
Did you ever make a video about interlocking stabilized soil blocks (ISSBs). A Kenya company called Makiga makes a manual press to make the blocks. The blocks are 90% soil and 10% cement. They are interlocking requiring no mortar. Have you made a video on ISSBs yet?
??? As an architectural engineering student, I became fascinated with the idea of underground buildings. The insulation qualities are intriguing. Can they be built in a green manor? Are maintenance costs reduced? How much more costly might they be from traditional construction? Are they safer from fire and tornado damage? As a lighting engineer, with clear story windows and skylights, it's possible to get ample daylight into this type of building for a pleasant space you'd want to live in. I'd be interested in your take on this subject.
