biotechnology Archives - IsoBio Project

Bio-based houses are seducing Latin America

The use of natural materials is growing rapidly in Argentina and other South American countries. Technical progress and policy implementation seem to go hand in hand

The green building phenomenon in Latin America has taken off. Bio-based aggregates have started penetrating the construction sector’s market, and the development of eco-friendly renewable products has increased the use of bio-based polymers in the construction industry, as a recent study shows.

South America is one of the emerging markets where a major demand in natural materials for buildings is expected in the next years. People today are indeed increasingly persuaded that they can safely get the same quality level as traditional products.

The policy implementation in the region following suit. Brazil, Mexico, Colombia, Chile and Peru have carried out different measures ranging from relevant tax cuts to soft loans for sustainable construction.

Although in Argentina this is still a new phenomenon, the situation and legislation are quickly changing. “In my country public interest and the market are also growing because young people are getting involved and interested in this topic,” says Juan Manuel Vazquez, an Argentinian agricultural engineer, who started using bio-based material for construction 15 years ago.

“I was working in an agronomic olive oil industry and I found that olive oil can lose quality in storage, in particular in countries with extreme climates. That was also when I first heard about straw bale warehouses, used for storing bulk food because of their insulation properties,” he told youris.com.

He later became co-founder of Henia Carbono Negativo, a company that develops pre-assembled panels of straw bales, using 100% biological material for dry construction, with high thermo acoustic, mechanical and fireproof performances. It was in La Cumbre, Córdoba, that they built their first family house of 250 m².

“We are now working to conquer the mass market, it will take time but not that much,” affirms the expert with conviction. “I recognise that my method may be a niche one, but I think that economic paradigms are changing. People are willing to pay a little more for green materials because it’s a matter of health and well-being.’

An eco-friendly house in Argentina would cost only 10% more than a traditional one, on the basis of Manuel Vazquez’s estimations. He also says that thermal insulation is seven times greater than that produced by a double hollow brick wall.

It is also resistant to fire and earthquakes. The straw used is kept compact, and without moisture, and it does not attract insects of any kind. High insulation potential, no pollution, and the fight against climate change are just some of the reasons which motivate him.

Henia’s experience is in line with ISOBIO, a EU project that proposes a strategy to mainstream bio-based construction materials. This is another source of inspiration for Manuel Vazquez. According to the European researchers, bio-based construction materials are in fact capable of achieving a 50% reduction in embodied energy and CO₂ emissions, with 20% better insulation properties compared to conventional materials such as bricks, cement and beams in walls and roofs.

There are several signs of policy changes to promote energy efficiency in Argentina’s buildings. For example, the city of Rosario has implemented a certification, carried out in 500 homes, which enabled household performance and energy-saving potential to be identified.

Specialist in bio construction Maria Loreto Retamales lives in a bio-based house in Valparaiso, in Chile, but her first eco-friendly house was in Argentina. “Ten years ago, I decided with my family to live in harmony with nature,” she explains. “I read about the architect Nader Khalili, his Cal Earth Foundation (California Institute of Earth Architecture), and his research and work with soil and sack.”

She studied his technique called “SuperAdobe”, a form of earth bag architecture, and now she trains other people on it as well. “In less than a year, I even gave workshops to architects and engineers in Argentina, Chile and Bolivia,” she tells us.

House built with the SuperAdobe technique. Photo credits: Maria Loreto Retamales

Maria Loreto has no doubt: “Living in a natural building has big advantages such as a more stable temperature and humidity. People don’t get ill so much. Moreover, earth isolates from the sun’s radiation and electromagnetic waves.”

Argentina has one of the most recognised bio constructors in the world, Jorge Belanko, specialised in earth buildings. Of course, this technique still remains quite unusual, but in the last 10 years Maria Loreto has seen hundreds of innovative projects developing.

Finally, one of the architectural symbols of the growing movement of natural builders in the country, is Tol-Haru, la Nave Tierra del Fin del Mundo, the first self-sufficient house in Latin America. It was built in Ushuaia, the closest city to Antarctica in 2014, using recycled materials. Wind and solar energy provide heating and cooling. The shelter also reuses rainwater and it even recycles waste.

Its construction has been promoted by the actors Mariano Torre and his wife, Elena Roger, members of the NAT Foundation (Nature Applied to Technology). The visionary architect Michael Reynolds helped them through the construction process.

By Anna Maria Volpe

Cover credits: Juan Manuel Vazquez

10 May 2018

Bio-homes to tackle the housing emergency

A new sustainable initiative in Bristol, in the UK, uses bio-based materials to face the need for additional and affordable housing supply

Bristol is at the forefront of high-tech innovation in the UK, named European green capital in 2015. But it is also the second least affordable major British city housing-wise only after London.

Its estimated population is 454,200 people, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS). Around 10,000 people are registered on the waiting list for a council home. There is a serious housing problem affecting both the young and the old.

To face the emergency, the Knowle West district is testing a new solution that is eco-friendly at the same time. We visited this neighbourhood in the south of Bristol, to discover how a community is trying to make possible a sustainable, affordable housing model using bio-materials.

The initiative, called We Can Make, gathered architects, designers, academics, policy makers, and residents. The result is a prototype house built on the grounds of a community centre, with the cooperation and participation of locals in the construction, plumbing, handmade carved furniture, art, and interior design.

The TAM (Transportable Accommodation Module) was designed and built using bio-materials such as straw, compress straw, and timber. These carbon capturing materials minimise their environmental footprint.

The building is cool in summer and warm in winter, saving hundreds of pounds per month in air conditioning and heating. Actually, as soon as we entered the house, the temperature and the moisture in the environment were right despite the cold weather and rain outside.

According to Dr. Charles Gamble, our guide and head of Innovation at Stramit International, which is part of CooBio company, the TAM uses 90 percent less energy to heat and light when compared to the UK average.

Dr. Charles Gamble, head of Innovation at Stramit International, shows samples of the compressed strawboard panels used in the TAM (By Susan Fourtané)

“The panels are made of compress straw and strawboard framed in timber and covered in clay,” he told youris.com. “Compress straw board has been around for almost 70 years since the technology was invented in Sweden in 1950. The process, also developed in the UK, provided building materials for more than a quarter million houses from the 50s to the 70s after which it became impossible to compete with plasterboard,” he added. These natural retrofitting solutions are also currently being tested at demonstration sites in the UK (Bath) and Spain (Seville) under the EU project Isobio.

Residents who have tested the TAM space overnight have reported that they slept better than usual, which is attributed to a good quality of air in the ambience. External people can rent it through Airbnb, and the income goes to the community centre.

“It’s the breathable nature of the building,” confirmed Finlay White from ModCell, which provided the straw panel systems, when we asked the difference from the traditional Victorian houses in England. “Around the windows in the buildings you don’t get condensation. This is one of the health benefits of using bio-materials,” he explained.

“The mapping of the Knowle West area identified thousands of small plots of land where TAMs could be put to relieve the housing situation for many of the families here who are stuck, because they have no employment or they’re too old. Sometimes you have three or four generations living in a small house,” Gamble said.

“A salary is £23,000 a year. The average price house is 8.4 times that,” added White, while the TAM cost for 36m² is £90,000, with both leasing and hire purchase options.

“What ‘We Can Make’ offers is a model that can be replicated in other regions involving local communities to develop in spaces that they privately own or the council owns, constructing the TAM systems locally to solve housing crisis,” said Gamble.

The team intends to place the houses approximately 200 metres from the community centre, hiring local people to help build the panels creating about 21 jobs in the location.

According to White, there have been identified 1500 potential sites in this area with seven similar more estates in Bristol, and “there are estates like these all over the UK that have the same housing issues.”

A report, We Can Make: civic innovation in housing, was released in October 2017 at the Festival of the Future City in Bristol. The project is in conversation with eight more councils around Britain where TAMs could potentially be built.

By Susan Fourtané

Photo credits: Stramit International

Low carbon materials to capture the imagination of homebuilders and owners

Innovation in the construction industry will play an important role in reducing emissions and improving energy efficiency — though developing new materials and methods is only half the battle. Convincing architects and homeowners of the performance and long-term financial benefits of a new product presents a significant challenge.

In Europe, households are responsible for 32% of greenhouse gas emissions and 42% of energy. Cement production alone contributes to 5% of manmade CO₂emissions.

By contrast, bio-based insulation typically have much lower “embodied energy” levels compared with more conventional building materials. Furthermore, the source materials themselves sequester atmospheric carbon dioxide via photosynthesis.

“The beauty of bio-based materials is that they are often a byproduct of growing our food. We can build with carbon. Instead of seeing carbon as a problem, we can recast our relationship with it to one of positive innovation”, says Craig White, director of ModCell, which produces straw-bale eco-homes.

The company is one of the 12 partners in academia, research and industry that are collaborating with the European project ISOBIO. It aims to deliver bio-based insulators with 20% better performance than conventional materials, leading to a 5% total energy reduction over the lifecycle of a building at reduced costs of 15%.

Producers of bio-based insulators have the advantage that users are both receptive to change and familiar with the products in some capacity. In a study conducted by the Architects’ Council Europe (ACE) for the Low Embodied Energy Insulation Materials (LEEMA) project, 94% of architects surveyed said they would consider using a new and innovative insulation material. An overwhelming endorsement for what remains a niche application in the construction and renovation industries.

Renovations present a key market for producers of new insulation materials. According to the Buildings Performance Institute Europe (BPIE), more than 40% of Europe’s existing homes were built before the 1960s, when there were few requirements for energy efficiency, leading to low insulation levels.

Increasing awareness of the importance of insulation among homeowners is an important consideration. Homeowners may be inclined to, for example, upgrade appliances and install energy saving light bulbs, unaware that retrofitting wall and roof insulation leads to the greatest savings opportunities.

Veronika Schröpfer, lead author on the ACE survey, believes that bio-based insulation materials will continue to move from the niche into the mainstream and that new skill requirements will not present significant roadblocks.

Schröpfer says new building materials are often applied the same way as commonly used ones and manufacturers usually offer training when this is not the case. She states the main concerns involve pricing and regulations in different European countries.

“For architects it is important that a new material has all the necessary certificates and that the product information is transparent, to quickly compare its performance and price with traditional products,” says Schröpfer.

White believes that developers will be receptive to change. “The challenge that ISOBIO will overcome will be to bring [products] to market at scale at the price point that matches their performance to market demand,” he says.

Europe’s construction industry has experienced a turnaround over the last two years. After registering negative growth in 2013, the industry grew by 2.1% this year, and is forecast to grow by a further 2% over the next five years.

Evidence suggests that a growing minority of these builds will involve green projects. A market report from the Word Green Building Council states the proportion of architects and engineers that dedicate 60% or more of their project load to sustainable builds more than doubled over a four-year period — from 13% in 2009 to 28% in 2013.

The report states that increasingly, industry consumers not only demand that new innovations improve performance, but also reduce environmental impact. Fertile territory for the right nature-inspired solutions.

By Angus McNeice