The fires raging in San Diego, California will come again. Fireproof housing will need to be built to prevent future losses. The concrete home or ICF built home provides a solution that goes beyond fire protection.
So, how do you build a fireproof house? Well, you use ICFs (Insulated Concrete Forms). ICFs are polystyrene forms that are assembled like Legos to frame the house. Then the forms are filled with concrete. They are reinforced with steel. The result– a concrete house. An ICF home only costs 1-4% more to construct than a traditional wood framed house.
In fire-wall tests, ICF and concrete walls withstood continuous exposure to intense flames and temperatures of up to 2,000 degrees F for as long as 4 hours without structural failure, compared with wood-frame walls that collapsed in an hour or less.
Besides being extremely fire resistant, concrete home provide added benefits. According to ICFA (Insulating Concrete Form Association) and PCA (Portland Cement Association) here are the added benefits:
- Lower energy bills. Homes built with ICF are 44% less expensive to heat and 32% cheaper to cool. The energy savings come from the higher insulating values for ICF walls (up to R-40, compared to wood frame’s R-9 to R-15 ) and tighter concrete-foam sandwich construction. A house in Minnesota, built with ICFs, was the first North American home to be certified by Germany’s Passivhaus Institute, the world’s toughest energy standard.
- Pest proof. Termites, carpenter ants and other natural home demolitian teams prefer a wood diet. Rodents don’t like eating through concrete that thick.
- Quieter. The tighter concrete construction allows less noise into the home — 80% less sound penetration than wood framed homes!
- More comfortable. According to the Concrete Network “The high thermal mass of the concrete also buffers the home’s interior from extreme outdoor temperatures, while the continuous layer of foam insulation minimizes temperature fluctuations inside the home by eliminating the cold spots that can occur in frame walls along the studs or at gaps in the insulation.”
- Healthier. ICF homes are less likely to provide an environment for mold and mildew because they do not contain organic material. In areas with radon, the gas is less likely to infiltrate the house.
- Storm and wind resistant. A concrete home will withstand much higher winds than wood framed construction. Tests have shown that ICF walls can hold up against flying debris from tornadoes and hurricanes with wind speeds up to 250 mph.
- Less deterioration. This is due to using non-biodegradeable materials that do not rot or corrode.
- Lower home insurance cost. A reinforced concrete shell is one of the factors insurance companies consider when underwriting a house.(NYT). While stick homes are left with a slab after a fire, hurricane or tornado, an ICF home will retain at least 50%, meaning less to pay out– insurers hate to pay claims.
Every year the number of ICF built homes doubles. Despite its use in other countries for over 40 years (it was patented in the 1960s), it only became popular in the United States during the 1990s. It is standard in Canada, where it was originally developed.
Sources: ICFA, BuildersWebsource; ICF Builder; PCA;
Further Reading:
Concrete Homes are Energy Efficient (The San Diego Union Tribune)
How to Build a Fireproof House (This Old House)
Enlisting a Fortress to Battle the Elements (The New York Times)
More ICF news here.
Top Image: New American Home 2004 in Las Vegas. (from PCA)
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Dome Sweet Dome Hurricane Proof Home
Earthquake Proof Pre-Fab
New Concrete Building Material Lets Light In: LiTraCon
Technorati Tags: wildfires, icf, housing, construction, ICFA, PCA, energy efficient home, green home, real estate
The developments atound Rancho Santa Margarita and a few other upscale communities including Stevenson Ranch in LA County had no damage because of the materials used to build them and the great job they did with getting a fire free zone around the developments.
My family has a vacation home in Nebraska that’s built on an IFC walkout basement. At night, it’s literally silent. I sleep really well there.
I’m almost finished building an ICF retirement home for my parents.
Here in Florida the major concerns were Storm winds and energy usage.
It is paired it with spray on foam insulation to create a safe, quiet energy efficient home.
I also planned it to ADA specks so they wont have to move until they want to!
Can you think of better qualities?
Barry
Thanks for this great post. I need to learn more about this type of construction as I live in Pensacola where hurricanes are a huge threat. I’m going to blog on this type of construction for my clients and give them a link to your post for more information. Seems like you’ve been reading my mind lately. I was at the beach recently taking pictures of the space ship house and the dome house. Then posts pop up on your site about the space ship and a link to the dome house. Very cool.
Karl
We have built a group of homes with ICF and can attest to the fact that they are disaster resistant to almost everything. These homes are along the Gulf coast, Indian Shores, Tampa Bay area. These homes are all Energy Star Qualified and Florida Green Coalition Certified. ICF homes are silent, healthy, stay cleaner, energy efficient, pest resistant, and comfortable. Visit our site for more details.
please check out some owner builder custom icf homes on my website www.icforms.com
We use this concrete forms in germany since 1976 and it is getting more popular because of the increased insulation demands from the government …
NextBlok
I hold a patent on the only Green (ICF) that is an easy and economical way to build with.
NextBlok composition is 85% recycled EPS expanded polystyrene mixed with 15% cement and other proprietary add mixtures. Of all the 25 ICF manufactures, NextBlok is much easier to build with, and carries all of the above mentioned attributes in your article.
NextBlok is currently seeking funding and when it is obtained it will blow away all of the current competition.
Watch for our web page which is under construction. www.nextblok.com. NextBlok is the way of the future.
While I clearly see the benefits of ICF technology, I don’t see why we have not adopted it to a greater extent. To all ICF builders on this post: What will it take to push ICF technology mainstream?
To “NextBlok” post author: Is there much interest for ICF technology among the investment community?
I suppose more awareness of current building method shortfalls
and the superior benefits of ICFs is a start.
Keep posting!
ICForms.com…nice pictures. You have any more?
Great topic!
The devastation from hurricane Katrina could have been avoided, if all of the houses in the Hurricane belt had been built with ICF’s. I have pictures of one house standing after being hit be a 21 ft storm surge, it was 100 meters from the shore in Mississippi. All that remained of the surrounding houses, were concrete slabs.
NextBlok is the only ICF that is GREEN and is very easy and fast to build with, and is the most economic of all the ICF’s available today.
It is my feeling that the insurance co’s need to specify ICF’s when they replace houses that have been destroyed be natural disasters. Soon thereafter they will realize an enormous saving and start to require that the structures that are to built must afford the protection that NextBlok does.
There are 550 ICF builders doing about $260 million a year. Their association claims a 13% increase year over year.
My figures show that the house framing factor of real estate is $26 billion per year, so the current builders of ICF homes have yet to be of any significant size to indicate that they are making a substantial penetration in the house building industry.
When NextBlok is funded we will make an incredible difference in the way housing is built, here in the U.S. and more importantly through out the entire world.
NextBlok is extremely easy to build with, it just glues and clicks together, thus saving at least 40% of the labor necessary to frame a house.
Don,
Keep me posted on NextBlock.
If you issue a Press Release, you can publish it here for free.
To: Don Walters
Is there an online web page for nextblok?
I would like to read more about your idea
and share the information with others who may
want to get involved.
Mike.
Learn more about the ICF inherently green industry at the Insulating Concrete Form Association website, www.forms.org, and visit green builder web sites directly, like www.greenblock.com to learn more about icf eco-friendly building solutions.
To Mike Tomwell;
We are in the process of designing a web page. When finished it will demonstrate that NextBlok is the only ICF that is green and is easy to build with. I feel certain that when you, along with others, see the simplicity and the ease of use of its design, will want to be among those that want to see it come to market, even to share by contributing to its success.
Fires for sure will come again as the temperature of our planet increases. Thanks for providing useful information about fireproof buildings. I hope all new buildings were like that.
Here’s another green building company poised to make a real difference:
www.vitruvianbuilt.com.
I’ve heard their product has already started to generate much interest.
You will find pictures and more information about their concept via their website.
Vitrubianbuild.com has good pictures and product information, as does Greenblock.com. Nextblok.com lacks any significant content, although claims to be greenest. Anyone else suggest other good manufacturer/builer sites for learning more about such timely building practice?