NATURAL BUILDING MATERIALS IN MAINSTREAM CONSTRUCTION:LESSONS FROM THE U.K.

INTRODUCTION The concepts of“green building”and“sustainable construction”have received tremendous interest in North America in the past decade,as shown by the growth in the numbers of L.E.E.D.™certified projects(Kibert 2005).Parallel to this has been a growing interest in“natural,”“vernacular,”or“traditional”building materials and techniques.Examples of these include straw bale construction and rammed earth construction.From an environmental point of view,these materials offer a low embodied energy and low embodied carbon alternative to conventional building materials such as concrete and steel(Woolley 2006,Walker 2007).In the case of straw bale construction,use is made of a waste material with excellent insulation properties.Other benefits of many natural materials include their ability to passively regulate humidity in a building,reduced toxicity,high thermal mass,and biodegradability at the end of life(Walker 2007).