Joan and Greg Dyer will soon have the first house in Missouri built with prefabricated straw insulation — and no amount of huffing and puffing can knock it down.
Building Integrity LLC, a Columbia-based construction company, is building the house for the Dyers near Cooper’s Landing.
Straw insulation is a relatively new technology, which gained popularity in Europe and was approved in the 2015 International Residential Code in the U.S. Using straw instead of typical insulation materials like polystyrene or fiberglass reduces a house’s carbon footprint, because straw absorbs carbon instead of emitting it.
Straw is also highly energy efficient, can be sourced locally and is a natural agricultural byproduct of growing cereal grains.
Adrienne Stolwyk is the co-owner of Building Integrity and owner of Monarch Architecture. She recommended straw insulation to the Dyers after using a similar method for her architectural office.
“I was confident in my ability to propose that they do prefabricated straw bale because New Frameworks, this company in Vermont, I had just recently found out that they were offering kind of a training class,” Stolwyk said.
Stolwyk and the Dyers met with New Frameworks to learn how to use the straw insulation on their home.
Greg Dyer acted as the general contractor on his house and said he was motivated to try something new with this project.
"Really it was a lot of the green, eco-mindset, the challenge aspect and then just something that hasn’t been done that we can show off on our farm when people visit," Dyer said.
Building Integrity is co-hosting a free open house on Saturday, Dec. 14 for members of the community to see the partially constructed house and learn about sustainable construction methods. Big bad wolves are not welcome.
