An alternative to building your home with wood

[1a2b3c]

http://insulatingconcretehomes.com/index.html

Amvic®, brought to you by Insulating Concrete Homes, is an insulating concrete form (ICF) building system. It's a lightweight, high-strength alternative to using steel or lumber in the construction of commercial or residential buildings.

The Amvic Building System is an innovative construction technique, combining one of the finest insulating materials, Expanded Polystyrene (EPS) with one of the strongest structural building materials, steel reinforced concrete. The result is a wall system of unmatched energy efficiency, strength and noise reduction. A structure built with the Amvic Building System is capable of reducing heating and cooling bills up to 70%, also provides superior safety for its occupants, with a continuous wind load rating up to 200 mph and a fire resistance of up to three hours.

The forms are environmentally safe and energy efficient. They do not contain chlorofluoro-carbons (CFCs), HCFC, formaldehyde, asbestos, or fiberglass. Also, Amvic directly reduces the lumber used in construction. Working in partnership with concrete, one of earth's most abundant materials, Amvic Forms are Environmentally Superior in every way.

[CentristDemocrat]

1. Here's an idea: BRICK

[1a2b3c]

2. HAHAHA

You cant build a home with brick.

[LibLabUK]

12. Uh?

"You cant build a home with brick."

Why?

[1a2b3c]

18. Brick is nothing more than rock siding

You could build a house with concrete or maybe cinder blocks but brick is too small and too weak to hold an entire house.

[NickB79]

14. What did I grow up in?

It sure looked like brick, the old yellow kind so commonly used to build Midwestern farmhouses. 100 years old and still standing and being lived in, thats a pretty good testimonial for brick usage. Plus, no A/C, but the house still remains a good 10F cooler inside during the summer.

[1a2b3c]

19. It was wood wrapped in brick.

although if it was a good hard stone and stacked in the right direction, it could be enough to hold a house. Ive never seen an entire foundation and home build by stone. More than likely your house was made of wood and the stones were used as a siding.

[Lefty48197]

17. That's not entirely true

and I know you know a lot about this subject.
Technically, it IS possible to build a home where the structural walls are made entirely of brick, just as was done about 100 years ago. However, these days it is not economically feasable to build structural walls out of brick. It's just too expensive, and there are more dependable methods of structural framing. The preferred alternative is to frame your walls, and then add a brick 'veneer'. That's how homes are built today. The brick walls that show are not structural. They're merely decorative.
I'm sure you also know a lot about steel stud framing 1a2b3c. That's another good alternative to wood framing. The material is far more stable and strong. It's lighter, takes up less space during shipping, and it doesn't burn either, like wood will.
Also, steel doesn't cost any more than wood framing either.
An added benefit, is that when you build using steel stud framing, then you're much more likely to be hiring a carpenter who is paid a living union wage. Well paid workers are also good.

[1a2b3c]

20. Ok you are right 100%

but i still wouldnt want a home build by rocks with holes in the middle, if you know what i mean. Steel is also good, but i believe it does cost more. It might average out though. It costs more to have built since its time consuming but it might be cheaper to buy the steel than the wood.

[Doug Decker]

6. hahahahahahahahahaaahahahhaaha

[kwolf68]

16. Thats what I did

My wife and I just bought a house in Maryland...it was a brick house...It has a very little wood on it, but not much.

[1a2b3c]

21. I think youd be very

very surprised.

[Melsky]

3. I live in a concrete block house

and it is very well insulated. It was built in 1954. It's in the desert, and it really helps to stay cool.

One of my dreams is to build a house with either straw bale or compressed earth construction.

[1a2b3c]

4. Cant say ive seen a compressed earth house.

I would have doubts on it lasting through the years from errosion.

[mhr]

9. Rammed Earth Is Very Stable

See this site:

www.rammedearthworks.com

[midnight armadillo]

23. The Great Wall

Some sections of the Great Wall in China are built from rammed earth. It is very stable, although this depends on the peculiarities of soil composition, compression, weather, etc.

[Champion Jack]

5. What are the square footage costs of this?

[1a2b3c]

10. I dont know

There website says it cheaper than wood. I dont know actual costs yet.

[Old and In the Way]

7. Log home here.....easy to build and great to heat/cool.

I recommend 'em.

[MercutioATC]

8. I built MY house with straw. Damn that wolf....

.

[Hawthorne]

11. Alternative building

I'm all for alternative building materials. A friend of mine commented that in reality we should all be living in shacks or very small structures as a way to reduce consumption.......this is probobly true, although that is something alot of Americans refuse to embrace-most americans, even supposed "progressives" want to admit they should downsize their dwellings.

[midnight armadillo]

24. Straw Bale Building + no wood construction

Straw bales: an agricultural waste that produces beautiful, sturdy, super-insulated (R40+)homes whose construction is accessible to anyone.

For info: A Google search

This is totally serious. If you want to get really radical in your building you can build Earthships: http://www.earthship.org , which are buildings that supply all of their own heat, water, and electricity without external inputs (like a grid connection or furnace). These are often built out of old tires rammed with earth and stacked like bricks.

The point of building with no wood is not to turn to high-energy-intensive construction methods like concrete block, but to use local materials that have low embodied energy. What is embodied energy? Example: aluminum requires massive energy expenditure to use. Concrete does too - lime uses much less. Clay from your own property is the lowest. Examples of natural building include the aforementioned straw bales, building with clay, straw, and sand ("cob"), building with waste logs ("cordwood"), and building with bags full of dirt ("earthbags"). Using waste and recycled materials in your construction is also good.

Concrete production accounts for like 10% of world CO2 output. Minimizing its use or using it only when necessary is a smart thing to do.

For info on the natural building movement, try:
http://www.dirtcheapbuilder.com/
http://www.greenhomebuilding.com/
http://www.daycreek.com
http://www.calearth.org

Enjoy!

[NickB79]

13. Why not use wood?

It appears this material is composed (at least partially) of non-renewable petroleum products. This at a time when we are fighting a war in the Middle East over oil resources? Wood, on the other hand, is fully renewable and easily grown and harvested throughout most of the US. You can grow wood in woodlots and tree farms as an alternative to the clearcutting of national forests, the primary reason to oppose wood use. Furthermore, when wood-containing homes are torn down, the wood can be collected for other uses, such as mulch, fertilizer, or wood pellets for alternative-energy generation. I see no reason to want to build a home with polystyrene.

[NNadir]

15. I agree that wood is environmentally preferable to concrete.

The growing of wood, done right, has profound environmental advantages. First of all, during the growing process, trees sequester carbon dioxide. Secondly, trees absorb and in many cases detoxify many other airborne pollutants. During the period that the wood is used, carbon dioxide is sequestered. Trees produce oxygen, and trees particularly deciduous trees provide cooling shade in summer and allow warming sun during winter. Trees have the added benefit of being excellent media for the capture of solar energy: This is where the energy from a wood fire comes from.

Concrete is made from slaked lime, meaning that calcium carbonate is decomposed giving off carbon dioxide. This carbon dioxide is resquestered during the curing process, but overall the entire process requires considerable heat and energy, meaning, under current conditions, that fossil fuels are burned for it's production.

An environmentalist however should be aware that some trees are more questionably used than others. Some rare woods are derived from uncontrolled "harvesting" in rain forests and some species are threatened. Some trees, redwood for instance, grow too slowly to be effectively "renewed." However, most North American forests that are cut for lumber are replanted. Improved forestry techniques such as avoiding clear cutting and the like should make wood an excellent enviromentally friendly renewable building material forever. It helps to do a little research when choosing a particular variety of wood.

(On this note I would like to invite everyone to visit the American Chestnut foundation website at www.acf.org to consider efforts to restore this nearly extinct lumber tree to our forests. It was attacked by an imported fungus.)

Of course the future of our forests are in doubt owing to Bushism, but hopefully sane honest government will soon return to the United States.

[1a2b3c]

22. What is the non renewable resource?

[NickB79]

25. This is a petroleum-derived product, correct?

It does state it uses polystyrene, which is usually produced from petroleum if I remember correctly. Unless you're thinking in the order of millions of years, petroleum isn't what I'd call renewable.