What Is Green Building?
(Page 2 of 8)
August/September 2005
By the Mother Earth News editors
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Straw Bale Construction
Excerpted from A House of Straw by Carolyn Roberts, Mother Earth News April/May 2003
In the early 1990s, I saw a TV show about a family without exceptional building skills who were building their own house with low-cost, natural materials that harmonized with our planet’s ecosystem. My do-it-yourself genes jumped for joy. I became obsessed with the idea of building a house made of straw bales, an abundant by-product of grain production, and finished with earthen plasters made from clay, sand and chopped straw. It couldn't be all that hard to stack up some bales and cover them with mud, I figured. This would be the ultimate craft project, save money and give me a beautiful home at the same time.
I kept studying everything I could find about natural building. It all made sense: By placing large windows on the south side of a house, we could use the low winter sun for heating and lighten our dependence on gas or electricity. By building walls with straw bales, we would have an R-50 insulation from the summer heat — more insulation than most homes even have in their ceilings. Of course, we would have to insulate the ceiling, too.
An earthen floor and earthen plasters would provide thermal mass for the interior of the house. Just as rocks absorb the heat of the sun and then continue to emit that warmth after the sun sets, the earthen plasters would heat or cool with the interior of the house and then emit and help maintain that temperature.
I thought we could build one of these houses slowly, over the years, somewhere out in the country, beyond the realm of building inspections — someday. However, my husband didn’t really share my dream. We ultimately went our separate ways: I found myself suddenly divorced and without enough monthly income to pay all our bills plus a mortgage; the time was upon me to turn my dream into reality.
The fact that I had no building experience, only $25,000 in savings and very little free time didn't bother me — at first. After all, I had a stack of how-to books on my coffee table and I would have the help of my two sons, Andrzej (pronounced ‘Andre’) and J.J. They were 15 and 17 when we began the construction of our straw bale home in the Sonoran desert near Tucson.
I was pretty sure I had an extreme challenge ahead of me, but I didn’t realize I’d be leaving my former life behind. In building this house I found new muscles, new ways of thinking and, especially, new friends. What I really wanted from my house was a joyful, meaningful life — and I found one.
The Plan
Straw-bale building experts Bill and Athena Steen, and an architect, Wayne Bingham, gave me a sketch and floor plan. They had been working on small, efficient house designs that consume fewer resources and cost less to build.
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