ICF’s and Livability
ICF’s and Livability ICF foundations are key in my mind to creating a healthy, comfortable home that will stand the test of time. For years in the PNW we have been building homes over unconditioned crawl spaces that are susceptible to water and other outside elements. By using ICF’s we gain the efficiency of an R20 insulated concrete wall vs R3 standard concrete wall, we'll also preserving the concrete from the elements. By using the ICF we are able to create conditioned crawl spaces, in conjunction with vapor barriers and rat slabs. This allows us to use the crawl space as a conditioned element of the home for HVAC and other mechanical systems that we would not want to leave in the outside elements. If you think of an unconditioned crawl space as a covered deck, you realize you are not mitigating many of the outside elements from this space, only direct rain fall.
We find that conditioned, thermally controlled crawl spaces, using ICF’s is a great way to go for our clients. We are able to keep the outside elements out of the home. Our focus is always on the thermodynamic relationship between inside and out of a home or building. When we look at the three principles of thermodynamics, hot moves to cold, wet moves to dry, and high pressure moves to low pressure, we see that trying to heat and cool a home with outside air below the homes takes more energy as well as brings in moisture to subfloor area. The real benefit to us working on the home is the crawl space becomes one of the areas that you do not need to dread going into anymore so service of the home is much easier. Nobody likes to work in a dirty, wet crawl area.
Are ICF’s hard to install? No, if you have ever built with Lego’s you can build with ICF’s. We find that ICF’s are easier to install than conventional walls, especially when going above 4’. The blocks lock together, they have integral clips for holding the rebar, and are truly square from the get go. We are big fans of Fox Blocks www.foxblocks.com and have used them on numerous projects. If you look at our project page, Edison, Willamette, and Net Zero are all fox block foundations and we have many more starting shortly.
The other benefit to using ICF’s on tall walls is less mobilization of materials to and from the projects. The ICF’s are the forms, so we do not need to move form trailers back and forth. As well, once setup and braced you don’t handle the forms again. Oh, and handling the forms is easy because they don’t weigh anything compared to a sheet of 1 1/8” form ply. We have found many benefits that far out weigh any of the presumed costs of conventional vs. ICF.
Cheers,
Nathan D. Young