[GSBN] straw/cell assembly

[Kyle Holzhueter]

Please find attached three photos of an small building built in February,
2010 in Fukushima Prefecture.
The building features a ventilated rainscreen, conventional timber frame,
blown in cellulose insulation, and straw bale wall.
The cellulose insulation was installed before construction of the bale wall
started.

I like this system for several reasons:
1. Construction needed to be completed by March, the end of the economic
year, so in February, with below zero temperatures and snow cover outside,
we worked comfortably inside.
2. In Japan, building codes require that conventional timber frames either
have structural plywood or significant diagonal bracing.  Generally the
bales are stacked on either the outside or inside of the timber frame. I
like that the space between posts can be used to increase insulation.
3. This system also compliments a ventilated rainscreen, which is often
recommended in Japan.
4. I've been monitoring outdoor, indoor and interstitial temperature and
relative humidity since construction, and the wall performs very well, that
is, is very dry.

Since the building is located roughly 30km from Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear
Plant and is in the evacuation area, we were only able to apply the scratch
coat of plaster.  It is interesting to note that the clay we used was
salvaged from the walls of a 150 year old farm house near by.
Also, Japan measures the strength of earthquakes not by magnitude, but by
the level of shaking, known as Shindo, on a 1-7 point scale.  The building
experienced a 6 on the Shido scale.  The earth oven outside fell apart and
the pavement around the building cracked, but the bale wall was fine. My
interpretation is that the stiffer timber frame absorbed the brunt of the
energy.

Kyle
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