Hemp at the heart of WA's first eco-villageFriday 22 Apr 2016
Project manager Paul Llewellyn said a key feature would be the combination of hemp hurd, the innards of the plant's stem, and lime, which is used to render the traditional timber frames. "The two combine to form a lightweight masonry product, which is very thermally efficient, breathes and has lots of acoustic properties," Mr Llewellyn said. "It provides a wall — which is much more thermally efficient than a double brick wall and is equal in effect to the thermal efficiency of a very wall insulated timber wall — but this wall breathes, which regulates the humidity in the house." Mr Llewellyn said though similar houses had been built in other parts of Australia, the Denmark project was the first of its kind for WA. Commercially referred to as hempcrete the product is commonly used throughout Europe and was the result of hemp manufactures looking to find a use for the "mountains" of hemp hurd leftovers. A thesis of the utilisation of hemp in the construction industry conducted by University of Western Australia student, Gareth Robert Shun'an Jones, concluded lime-hemp concrete (LHC) met sustainability and environmental concerns while also "exceeding in many areas of building performance". The author surmised LHC "provides a superior overall performance in terms of sustainability and comfort levels than comparative 'green' building materials, including autoclaved aerated concrete, rammed earth and straw bales". However, the thesis concluded LHC was not being widely used due to research and information still disseminating throughout the scientific and public community. Photo: A home in France built with rendered with lime-hemp concrete. (Supplied: Paul Llewellyn) Source: ABC Great Southern  | ||
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