last updated 6th January 06
by 4ecotips.com

Highlights environmental and economic potential

Hemp is perhaps best known for its use in healthy foods and as a cotton substitute in clothing. But it is slowly gaining profile as a building material as well. The Centre for Alternative Technology (CAT) is hosting a conference Industrial Use of Hemp on Saturday 11 March 2006 at Llwyngwern, Machynlleth, Powys in North Wales.

Keynote speakers will give an overview of the environmental and economic possibilities of growing hemp in the UK. The programme includes a wealth of expertise on the subject, including Professor Tom Woolley of Belfast University and Dr Tim Yates of the B.R.E who will speak about the Haverhill Housing Project in Suffolk.

Hemp is a highly versatile material, already used in a range of applications, including paper, health food supplements and fabric. Add to the list a new use - environmentally friendly building materials.

The conference is open to all. Tickets are available from the CAT courses office. Price £10 per person, which includes entrance fee to CAT and tea and coffee.

Book your place through the CAT courses office on 01654 705981 or email courses@cat.org.uk

A variety of wood-like products, such as fiberboard, can be made from the compressed woody core of the plant according to an article in the Canadian Natural Life magazine.(www.life.ca) The fibres can also be used like straw in bale wall construction or with mud in a sort of modified cob style of building. A natural product, it is environmentally friendly, produces no toxic by products and is fully recyclable. It is thermally efficient, resulting in lower fuel costs. It absorbs sound and is non-flammable.

More than 250 houses have been constructed in France using a product made of hemp fiber and lime. The hemp building product, called Isochanvre, has won awards as an environmentally-friendly and innovative product.

And now, a social housing organization in Suffolk has completed a test project that studied the environmental impact, energy use and other factors of hemp housing in comparison to more traditional construction methods.

Suffolk Housing Society provides and manages over 1,300 homes for people who need housing at affordable rents. In Britain's first hemp housing project, the organization built two hemp, lime and timber houses in a terrace alongside their brick and block counterparts as part of an 18-unit social housing development.

The project was studied by the Building Research Establishment (BRE) in regards to the sustainability, economic and environmental differences between the two construction methods.

The first tenants moved into a two-bedroom hemp home in and for three months, their lives were closely monitored by sophisticated instruments measuring qualities such as insulation, energy efficiency, sound proofing, structural stability, resistance to water and condensation factors.

The BRE report's principal conclusions are that while the hemp homes have far less impact on the environment - they use less energy to build, create less waste and take less fuel to heat - they cost about 10% more to build than brick and block houses. The complete research findings have been published in a report and the full text can be downloaded at: www.bre.co.uk/pdf/hemphomes.pdf.