HempBuild Magazine: News About the Hemp Building Industry

Hemp Retrofit Planned for South Bronx Tenement in NYC

Students from the Pratt Institute are teaming up with local community group Mothers on the Move to explore how hemp—a building material rarely used in housing—could help retrofit New York’s oldest buildings, improving indoor air quality and lowering heating and cooling emissions.

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$1M Awarded to NY Hemp Materials Research Team

An industrial hemp research team at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) in Troy, New York has been awarded $1 million to build a state-funded manufacturing laboratory designed to bridge the gap between raw hemp fiber and the industrial market

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Hemp Builders to Gather in Denver for IHI Conference

Hemp builders and manufacturers of industrial hemp-based building materials will be well-represented at a new conference in Denver planned for March.

The first Industrial Hemp International conference will take place March 25-27 at the Hyatt Regency Aurora-Denver Conference Center. The conference and expo is organized by Morris Beegle and the experienced team that ran the NoCo Hemp Expo for 11 years in northern Colorado.

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VA Board Votes to Adopt Hemp-Lime in Residential Building Codes

Virginia-based hemp-lime builder Scott McStacy single-handedly submitted a proposal to adopt International Residential Code Appendix BL (Hemp-Lime “Hempcrete” Construction) into the Virginia Uniform Statewide Building Code – and on Jan. 6, McStacy appeared before the Board of Housing and Community Development’s General Stakeholder Workgroup Meeting in Glen Allen, VA  and urged the board to adopt Appendix BL. The vote was unanimous in favor. 


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KS Hempcrete Build Unites KSU and Habitat for Humanity

The Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation’s agriculture business grows hemp without irrigation, insecticides or plowing. Now its product is helping to build a home in Ogden, KS.

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Hemp Build Podcast Ep. 5 Hemp: High-Performance Building Material | Inside a Texas Hemp Processing Facility

In this episode of the Hemp Build Podcast, host Ray Kaderli goes inside the Cleburne, Texas facility of CannaVision with CEO David Russell to show how industrial hemp is processed into consistent, construction-ready materials.

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Lower Sioux Hempcrete Program Advances Local Farming

The Lower Sioux Indian Community is on a mission to get its members into healthier homes. Since 2016, the indigenous community, located in Morton, Minnesota, has been growing the main material necessary to build affordable, sustainable homes right on the reservation: hemp. 

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Hemp Build Podcast Ep. 3: Ep. 3 Inside a Hempcrete Engineer’s Playbook

Colorado engineer Mark Benjamin of Greeley-based Crown Jade Engineering joined Hemp Build School for the third in a podcast series spotlighting leaders in the hemp building industry and tailored to architects seeking continuing education (CE) credits.

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Hemp Build Podcast Ep. 2: Seed to Structure: Understanding U.S. Hemp Supply Chains for Building Materials

Hemp Build School rolled out a second in a podcast series spotlighting leaders in the hemp building industry and tailored to architects seeking continuing education (CE) credits in December.

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Hemp Build Podcast Ep. 1: Designing & Building Healthy Hemp Homes

Hemp Build School rolled out a new podcast series spotlighting leaders in the hemp building industry and tailored to architects seeking continuing education (CE) credits.

Guests from Colorado-based Healthy Hemp Homes were Eric Milburn, Tanner Bowman and David Milburn

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Cornell U Invests in Hemp Building Equipment

According to builder Jeff Gagnon, a space that’s been insulated with hemp materials stays warm in winter, cool in summer, emits no toxins and is as quiet as snow.

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MN Hempcrete Builders Help Form New Green Building Coalition

Hempcrete builders in Minnesota are taking a leadership role in the newly launched Minnesota Efficient Builders Coalition (MEBC), which will advance efficient, high-performance, and low-carbon residential construction.

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Swiss Company Launches Carbon Program for Biogenic Buildings

The Swiss construction company Openly introduced last month a new class of CO₂ certificates monetizing the carbon dioxide permanently sequestered in buildings constructed with biogenic materials like hempcrete and timber. The launch follows a year of development, founders said.

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Hemp Building Materials Hold Their Own at Greenbuild in Los Angeles

At this year’s Greenbuild Conference and Expo, held Nov. 4–7 in Los Angeles, bio-based building materials took the spotlight — both on the show floor and in one of the conference’s most crowded sessions.

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French Heritage Lime Firm Socli Expands into Hemp Building Materials

A French lime manufacturer best known for heritage restoration is entering the hemp-lime construction market with a new family of products designed for hempcrete and other plant-based building materials.

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Hempcrete Fire-Testing Updates Approved for 2027 US Building Codes

Hemp-lime (hempcrete) construction in US residential building codes took a major step forward in Cleveland last week when proposed updates to Appendix BL of the 2027 International Residential Code (IRC) were unanimously approved during the International Code Council (ICC) Committee Week proceedings. An online fundraiser successfully raised more than $12,000 to pay for the code adoption.

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Hemp Building Industry Gathers at Lower Sioux for International Symposium

International and US experts in hemp-lime construction gathered at the Lower Sioux Community in Morton, MN to celebrate hemp-based building materials at the 13th Annual International Hemp Building Symposium this month. Co-hosted by the Ireland-based International Hemp Building Association (IHBA) and the Lower Sioux Hemp Program, the event featured both scientific research and practical applications of bio-based building materials.

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Restoring the Ruined Portugal Village of Chumbaria with Hemp

When my husband, Steve, and I moved from the UK to Portugal’s Silver Coast, we certainly didn't plan on buying an entire ruined village. Our original idea was just a small house and an Airbnb conversion. But then Chumbaria caught my eye online—it was love at first sight! We bought the small cluster of derelict stone buildings for €200,000, and our epic renovation journey began.

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