Innovative ways companies are building homes faster and more ecofriendly

With natural disasters, an affordability crisis, and limited land on which to build, those in the construction and design industries are creating innovative green solutions to reshape the way we build.

These three local companies are trying to create innovate ways to build consciously, create projects that withstand, and cost you less money in the long term.

RENCO

Construction in today’s day and age is pretty standard.

“There are basically three materials to build with. You have steel, you have wood, and you have concrete. And that’s it. There hasn’t been a change in 100 years,” explained Patrick Murphy, Managing Director of RENCO, a company that aims to go a different way.

RENCO has created a composite building system made up of recycled glass, recycled plastic, calcite, and resin.

“Bottom line is that this building material is stronger, it’s faster to build with, it’s less expensive and it’s greener than traditional building materials, so it checks all of the boxes.”

And they look like life size Legos.

“It’s much faster not only to build the structure, but when you are building the interior you know the sizes of things because these pieces come from a mold so they fit perfect. You are not measuring or tweaking because it’s an inch off, it’s exactly as we tell you it’s going to be,” Murphy said.

He explained that the structure that looks like a shed, takes about an hour to build and the good news is that it’s a fraction of the cost, compared to a conventional build.

RENCO claims that it’s 20 to 30% less expensive than traditional building materials like concrete or wood, and the reason is because you can basically build it yourself.

“This is all unskilled labor to build this. You don’t need skilled masons, you don’t need a long training, we have a 2-hour training we put people through and then they are off to the races. Whether it’s building a single-family home or 5 story apartment building,” Murphy said.

How a build works is you pour a concrete slab and erect the RENCO blocks. You can stucco the exterior and the interior just needs drywall.

Murphy said that RENCO’s materials are 82% more green than steel construction and 60% more green than traditional concrete construction.

And after 10 years of testing, the blocks have received category 5 approvals. They can withstand seismic activity, termites, fire and water.

The Lego-looking blocks have been used in the construction of one commercial project, a 96-unit apartment building that only used 22 unique pieces.

A single-family home could be completed in a day with five people.

RENCO says that they will be opening their first domestic factory in the U.S. next year, and already have both commercial and residential projects in the works.

Kobi Karp

Something else that’s easy? Prefabricated rooms.

“It’s a much more thoughtful way to move forward, it is the correct way to move forward, and it’s the only way to move forward and that’s where we are going,” said architect and interior designer Kobi Karp.

According to Karp, the creation of spaces in a building has always happened on site.

But his company is now using new technology to create complete bathrooms, living rooms, and more that arrive to a site already made.

“It’s much easier because you can come, you can lift it and it comes as a pre-fab and you can just come in and bring it in. You don’t have to go up and down elevators, the whole labor. The boxes that come in are disposable and recyclable, there is so much waste that goes by manufacturing and cutting pieces in the field, rather than doing it in a warehouse,” he said.

Karp said you choose exactly what you want, and the areas are fabricated in a warehouse in a sort of assembly line production. The rooms come with all the details- toilet paper holder included!

And everything that’s created, is also eco-friendly.

“All the materials we use today, more so than ever before they are recycled materials...so the material in the pre-fab and or construction is a lot of recycled materials and that helps us on three levels, we are not relying on out sources, and two we have sources that have already recycled the garbage, whether it’s plastic or aluminum or wood, whether it’s paper or steel. And we can control our lines of supply, that is so important for us,” he said.

The construction is also category 5 impact certified, with materials that are resilient to natural weather events.

Printed Farms

And the same could be said for the projects done by Printed Farms.

“It got started because I felt that the conventional methods of building were not going to meet the demands of the future and sustainability for climate impacts like you just witnessed,” explained James Ritter.

The third project his company has done is an equestrian facility located in Wellington, Florida.

And as you stand outside of the building, looking out at all the destruction of the recent storms, you can see it withstood the tornadoes of Hurricane Milton.

The building’s foundation and walls were created with a 3D-printer.

“The current 3D systems, the ones we used for this process is the gantry system. It has four legs on feet, the mixing system and pump system is separate from the printer over to the side and you mix your 3d print material, into the mixer system, it’s pumped up into the head, which is 50 to 100 feet of hose, and then from the head it lays down a bead that is 1 inch high and 2 inches wide of print material,” Ritter explained.

It looks like ridges. Ritter points out an example, “You can see the layers, 1 inch and how they come up.”

And after some stucco and paint you can’t tell the difference.

The walls need no sheetrock or drywall, as they are made of cement.

The printing process happens on site and Ritter says one plus is the freedom of design.

“I can print a curved wall or a round building like you saw at the same cost of doing something straight. In the future we can do more ergonomically building projects because we are not so limited by the shapes of the building materials that were used in the past.”

And while the 3D printed project can withstand the strongest of storms and is expected to stand for hundreds of years, it is not readily available to every consumer.

Ritter said the machine alone costs about $500-$800,000.

“That price will drop as the industry grows, and that is one of the problems with growing the industry is the cost of the machines. The other issue is the delivery systems. The delivery systems currently are that you mix your material wet, you put it through a pump system to the head.”

“We are going to innovate that and do a completely different delivery system. And the third is the building material. The material has to be more work friendly so we can go faster and higher with our print.”

But even so, Ritter believes it’s the way to a sustainable future.

“As [we get] better materials, better printers, more trained crews, as it’s accepted and it grows, and I truly believe it’s going to grow, we are going to capture…a large percentage of the market, because one is insurance. 50,000people lost their insurance, we had a catastrophic event here and it cost the insurance companies very little. You have a little roof damage, you have some gutter damage, but the building was not injured form the tornado,” Ritter explained.

“So, if you can protect the insurance company by having to lay out large amount of capital every time a storm happens or large climate event happens, they will come back into the market, and the whole system works better.”

Printed Farms says they have developed their own print system that will be available early spring, and should increase the speed of printing in the field.