Straw bale construction: a New Mexico experiment - Residential Real Estate

New Mexico Business Journal, Dec, 1993 by Jack Hartsfield

WHEN PEOPLE TALK about affordable housing in New Mexico, Tony Perry talks about straw.

That's right. Straw.

Perry, British-born chairman of the technical advisory council on straw bale construction for the New Mexico Construction Industries Division, says it's no pipedream.

Straw bale construction has been used in the U.S. since before the turn of the century if not earlier, but it may well be on its way to a significant comeback with a lot more sophistication in New Mexico.

Perry, a former economist at Oxford University and former international entrepreneur involved in creating U.S. jobs for Europeans, has spent three years trying to develop and promote straw bale construction for affordable housing in New Mexico.

Perry, president of Straw-bale Construction Management Inc. in Santa Fe, contends the building technique can cut the costs for an $80,000 house in half.

"We're not just talking costs, but efficiency and the environment as well," says Perry.

"It's obvious that straw bale construction is less expensive when it's relatively simple for unskilled labor to help build a house," says Perry. "Sixty-five percent of the cost of any standard house today is labor.

"And if you consider the environment, not to mention the Spotted Owl, the price of wood keeps going up, too," he says. "The lumber futures the other day went to just under $400 per thousand board feet.

"We clearly can't afford to continue using wood at those kinds of costs," he says.

"Straw, unlike wood, is renewable annually," he says. "Right now we burn 200 million tons of straw in the fields a year around the nation.

"And in California alone, burning rice straw creates more pollution in that state in a year than all of the pollutants by public utilities over the same period," he says.

Eleven experimental permits have been issued in the last year by the state's Construction Industries Division to study the viability of the building technique for New Mexico. Seven building contractors and architects were involved.

Eight of the straw bale construction homes are finished or nearly finished at sites in the Santa Fe area, Silver City, Deming, Dixon and Jemez Springs.

Within a year or less, New Mexico may become one of the few government entities in the nation to include straw bale construction as a valid and acceptable addition to building codes.

PERRY'S PRIVATE COMPANY is currently under contract to the federal government to research the design and building problems associated with straw bale construction for affordable housing.

"This work will also measure the impact of the construction method on the labor market, the lumber market, the transportation business, the environment and provide accurate information about the time and costs involved in these buildings," says Perry.

The University of New Mexico School of Architecture is already under contract with Perry's firm for the design phase of straw bale construction.

Perry's firm is also working with the New Mexico Community Foundation to establish an Affordable Housing Education Fund intended to amass available information for all alternative building materials and methods that could help reduce the cost of home-building.

Perry, also president of the Straw Bale Construction Association, says his private firm is a licensed contractor acting primarily as a consultant working for home owners, other contractors and architects.

His family, incidentally, was in the building business from 1708 until 1938 in Great Britain.

While straw bale construction requires some unusual techniques including steel rebar through the bales and a masonry technique on the inner and outer surfaces, the method not only reduces costs but provides excellent insulation.

PROPONENTS ALSO CLAIM straw bale construction is more fire-resistent than wood construction and isn't a polluting source.

Walls for a straw bale construction house may be as thick as five feet, requiring more space on a building lot than conventional housing and more roof area for the usable space below.

"On the efficiency side, depending somewhat on how the bale is packed, straw bale construction can provide an R-45 insulation rating and that's using passive solar," says Perry. "Heating bills can be cut 60 percent."

He contends that homebuilding in the very near future will have to change to make homes affordable for buyers -- and new building techniques like straw bale construction may well lead the way.

"If, for example, New Mexico builds 10,000 houses in the next few years using straw bale construction, that means $275 million to the economy," he says.

Jack Hartsfield is editor of the New Mexico Business Journal.