Home for the Holidays
A family loses its Louisiana home, but
finds new hope and a new home in New York.
By Carol Brzozowski
Photos Courtesy Oldcastle Precast
Inc.
When
Mary and Andres Luz, their 11-year-old daughter Yacary
and 13-year-old son Andres Jr. rang in the new year,
their celebration was reminiscent of that of the Pilgrims
during their first holiday. But instead of Plymouth,
Mass., they feasted in their new home in Yonkers,
N.Y.
The Luz family was driven away from
their former home in New Orleans by Hurricane Katrina.
The Luz family had just relocated
from New York to Louisiana in the beginning of summer,
seeking a better life, when “Hurricane Katrina
sent us back,” Mary Luz says.
Like so many others, their lives
were temporarily torn apart. Their apartment was reduced
to a “couple of sticks” with their furniture
and other possessions hopelessly destroyed.
They left for New York, where their
lives – as well as that of five other families
– are now on solid ground thanks to the efforts
of several precast concrete companies and Habitat
for Humanity of Westchester, N.Y. Together they built
three duplexes using carbon fiber reinforced concrete
(CFRC), a relatively new technology.
This
Habitat project consisted of three 1,200-square-foot,
two-story duplexes – each with three bedrooms,
one and a half bathrooms and a basement. It is the
first single-family residential construction project
in the country using CFRC.
“We had never manufactured
a 100-percent precast home before with the foundation,
floors, walls and the roof,” says Harold Messenger,
vice president of product development for Oldcastle
Precast of Rehoboth, Mass., the company that introduced
CFRC and spearheaded the Habitat project.
CFRC,
a lightweight precast concrete panel, integrates C-Grid
– CFRP thin grids – as a secondary reinforcement,
replacing steel mesh and shear trusses in precise
concrete products.
According to the AltusGroup –
a partnership of five precast concrete industry leaders
– Oldcastle’s CFRC components reinforced
with C-GRID are thinner and up to 66 percent lighter,
which reduces foundation, structural and seismic connection
loads and lowers shipping and erection costs.
CFRC also has seven times the tensile
strength of steel reinforcing and is more corrosion-resistant,
minimizing shrinkage cracks up to 50 percent more
effectively than steel mesh.
CFRC energy efficiencies are realized
through 100 percent of the R-value of insulation delivered
through the panels, with higher values achieved in
thinner wall sections. Additionally, cold spots created
by solid concrete or steel reinforcing are eliminated.
Michael Smith, president of Equus
Design Group in Belmont, Mass., which was part of
the Habitat for Humanity Yonkers construction effort,
says carbon fiber reinforced concrete offers several
advantages over conventional concrete.
While his firm “loves”
cast-in-place concrete, “it has not proven to
be cost-effective for most building enclosures,”
he says.
“On the other hand, precast
concrete offers higher manufacturing tolerances, greater
speed of construction and a controlled production
environment. Panelized precast concrete also offers
fewer joints than other building products such as
masonry or wood, meaning less concern over water and
air infiltration,” among other attributes, he
says.
Smith says that while precast concrete
is the “most underutilized product in the housing
industry,” it was chosen for the Habitat project
for these reasons and more.
“It is one of the most sustainable
building products available. It is resource-efficient,
energy-efficient and resistant to mold, it is extremely
durable – it can withstand fires, hurricanes
and floods – and it is beautiful. Some of the
world’s most beautiful buildings are concrete,”
he says.
In order to pull off the Habitat
for Humanity project successfully, those involved
say convincing the New York City building inspection
department to approve the technology was the biggest
challenge.
“However, the manufacturers
met the larger challenges in the project,” Smith
says. “As the first project with floors, roofs
and walls was built using new, thin, lightweight members,
significant educational development and retooling
was required in the plants.”
Messenger says that New York City
officials became so enamored by the technology as
to request another 25 homes constructed with CFRC
to replace homes being demolished in one of the state’s
oldest housing projects. He also notes that the AltusGroup
has worked intensely to modify the products and technology
for reconstruction efforts in the hurricane-ravaged
Gulf coast region of Louisiana.
Jim Killoran, Habitat for Humanity
Westchester director, advocates CFRC in Habitat for
Humanity’s Gulf coast reconstruction efforts.
Habitat for Humanity International plans to build
and repair 250 of its own houses – as well as
others – in that region. Killoran believes that
the reconstruction effort should include precast concrete.
Killoran is a strong advocate for
precast concrete playing a major role in the rebuilding
effort. “After Hurricane Katrina, we think this
will have a profound impact on the housing industry
in areas like the Gulf Coast,” he says.
“I’ve talked to Habitat
International about that,” Killoran says. “We’re
the first ones to introduce it up here, and we want
to make sure that gets to the table.”
The Yonkers effort began when Oldcastle
and the AltusGroup approached Habitat for Humanity
to assess the organization’s interest in having
homes built utilizing CFRC.
Oldcastle Precast started working
on the technology in April 1998. After two years,
Messenger’s company determined it would take
up to $3 million to bring the technology front and
center, so it developed a consortium with four other
precast concrete industry leaders to develop and market
the technology.
Testing 30,000 cycles of a panel
to replicate 100 years of hurricane loads was one
of the many analytical trials the product underwent
prior to going to market.
After the companies financed the
effort, a vigorous testing program was initiated with
three universities and private laboratories. Presently,
the AltusGroup is nearly three-quarters complete with
the testing, working with American National Standards
Institute (ANSI) and American Society for Testing
and Materials (ASTM) to get approvals.
In the meantime, some 5 million
square feet of the material is now in place throughout
the country in multifamily residential, commercial
and industrial applications, with another 7 million
backlogged.
Traditionally, Habitat for Humanity
builds with wood frame construction.
“I love the feel of wood,”
Killoran says. “But [Habitat for Humanity] is
very parochial in terms of thinking a house should
be made out of wood.”
Killoran was attracted to the qualities
that CFRC had to offer.
“We thought it would help
to be fireproof, termite-proof, even bulletproof (one
family in his district lost a child to a shooter),
go up quicker, soundproof in more urban areas, and
there would be fewer maintenance costs for our families
in the long run in terms of replacing siding,”
he says.
Derrick Williams with Construction
Technologies in New Rochelle, N.Y., a company that
does a great deal of high-end construction and was
involved in the Yonkers project, says working with
the CFRC saves his company an estimated 15 percent
in labor compared with steel.
“It’s a lighter product,
easier to move around than steel,” he says.
“Other than that, it’s still a lot of
form-oriented work to put the precast together.”
The foundation for the project was
dug May 26, with all families expected to move in
by the new year.
“Like all great construction
projects, we’ve had some lengthy delays,”
Killoran says. But none of the delays were caused
by the choice of building materials.
While the first house for Habitat
for Humanity took two days to put up, it could have
been done in one day, but the location with high buildings
on either side presented challenges for the crane,
Messenger says.
In addition to Oldcastle, those
of the AltusGroup who joined in on the effort include
High Concrete Group of Denver, Pa., and Chase Precast
of North Brookfield, Mass.
Killoran is happy with the results.
He calls the construction of the CFRC homes “volunteer
friendly.”
“We think they’re excellent
and very strong,” Killoran says of the homes.
“They will help put us on the map in various
ways. We’re very excited that we’re the
first in the country to utilize carbon fiber reinforced
technology.”
Messenger notes Habitat for Humanity
has a difficult time getting volunteers to frame homes.
Those who live in the city instead of the suburbs
are less likely to have experience in home construction
and repair activities. Though they may have a background
in doing interior work on their homes, they’re
less likely to know how to do such tasks as framing,
he adds.
“So when we come in with a
shell that’s not finished – there’s
no windows in it, for instance – and say we’re
going to put it up, that’s music to their ears
in the city,” he says.
Another reason why CFRC is being
embraced is that in older cities, “the fire
problem is enormous because the homes’ wood
is dried out — they are really a kindling box,”
Messenger says. “They are much more readily
acceptable of this technology.”
At every turn, the AltusGroup has
tried to replicate the traditional look to which people
in a particular market are accustomed, whether it’s
brick, clapboard or stucco.
Another factor that attracts people
to the technology is that the inside is soft, so it
can be worked with in traditional ways, “meaning
they can put up sheetrock or paneling, so if there
are changes that need to be made later – add
a closet or an Internet connection – you can
do that. You’re not giving them a solid concrete
panel that’s impossible to alter,” Messenger
says.
Messenger says there’s no
question the technology is ready to take off in the
homebuilding marketplace. “The market we are
going after is the multifamily market,” he says.
“As the pre-cast industry, we need to have replication,
we need to be able to make the same parts over and
over again to become efficient and make money.
In the Habitat case and the case
of the Gulf Coast, we’ve proposed they make
their changes with color and other optional accessories
and decorations rather than change the precast.”
The AltusGroup is proposing a plant
to be constructed in the Gulf Coast area, giving regional
residents jobs by training them in making the CFRC
panels.
“You’re making 500 panels
alike. After you’ve made the first 10, the rest
are the same, so it’s easy for us to train relatively
unskilled people to do the job,” Messenger says.
Construction Technologies’
Williams says that although he prefers steel for now,
should CFRC stand the test of time with respect to
corrosion and stress, he would favor it over steel.
He says he had fun working on the CFRC-constructed
houses and would like to see the technology take off.
“It definitely could be a plus for the industry,
in the turnaround time of building houses, especially
in the right environment,” he says.
Smith says after working on what
is the first housing project in the nation to use
carbon fiber reinforced concrete for walls, floors
and roofs, he is more inclined to continue this route
in future design projects. “There is no turning
back now; carbon fiber reinforced concrete building
products are here to stay,” he says. “It
has taken awhile, but the concrete industry has finally
joined other industries such as aircraft, space, automotive
and sporting equipment manufacturers in the embrace
of advanced lightweight reinforcement technology.
We are at the threshold of a new age in building design.”
As for the Luz family, their story
has a happy ending. They’ve enjoyed working
on their new house – and their 11-year-old son
pitched in on the sheetrock work.
“It feels wonderful,”
says Mary Luz. “I’m excited it’s
actually happening. With so much that we’ve
gone through, having our own place is even better.
It’s like a dream come true.”
Project:
Habitat for Humanity Housing – Willow
Owner: Andres and
Mary Luz family
Engineer: Equus Design
Group
Contractor: Construction
Technologies
Precast Manufacturers:
Oldcastle Precast Inc. of Rehoboth, Mass., High Concrete
Group of Denver, Pa., and Chase Precast of North Brookfield,
Mass.
