Model home previews product of new plant

A model home currently under construction just outside the New Iberia corporate limits is utilizing a new building material said to reduce power consumption costs and withstand everything from hurricanes to termites.

The product, ThermaSAVE, is a four-inch thick panel of polystyrene (Styrofoam) with layers of laminated fiber cement on either side. It was developed during the past 30 years by H.H. “Hoot” Haddock of Florence, Ala.

The model home, located along U.S. 90 off the service road next to the J.P. Thibodeaux Nissan dealership, is being constructed by Mississippi Structural Insulated Panels.

“We’re putting up a plant here to manufacture the panels, and we’re building this house to show the area just what this product can do,” said Gabe Sigue, spokesman for Louisiana SIP, which will be partnering with MSIP in the project.

The plant will be near the intersection of Louisiana 675 and U.S. 90, “after all the construction there is finished,” Sigue said.

MSIP was founded by Joseph LaRocco, Vincent Carreca, Tom Teel and Eddie Hartwell, who met during the rebuilding of the Gulf Coast in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

Teel and Hartwell lived in Gulfport, Miss. LaRocco and Carreca were volunteering their labor to help in the reconstruction, Sunderland said. The four came up with an idea to find a better building material, one that could better withstand hurricane-force winds and, as a result of their search, found Haddock.

The prefabricated panels look like thick sheets of plywood insofar as the dimensions. They come in sheets 4 feet wide by 8, 10 or 12 feet long.

Putting up a foam house is like putting up a giant puzzle. The panels are mostly precut and are labeled to make sure they’re put up in the right order, hoisted into place and connected using special fasteners. It only takes about a week to get the house up.

“We’ll start putting up the walls this afternoon and by tomorrow (Thursday) morning we’ll be putting on the roof,” LaRocco said Wednesday morning.

The panels are rated to withstand hurricane-force winds. They have an insulation rating of R55, about three times the insulation value used in a refrigerator, and any paint can be used on the fiber-concrete panels.

“The panels are waterproof so, actually, no roof is required, but we put roofs on for aesthetic reasons,” Hartwell quipped. And since it is not made of wood or wood products, “termites don’t eat it,” he added.

Butch Landry, a Youngsville councilman who is also a salesman for LASIP, said the cost of constructing a home using the prefabricated panels is “about 3 percent higher for materials, but you save that much and more on labor and, ultimately, utilities.”

The product has been endorsed by the Federation of American Scientists and is also accepted by the International Code council for building material codes.

Sunderland said a group from Poland and one from New Orleans will be coming to evaluate the model home once it is completed.

“Also, a building contractor will be evaluating the product for use in 600 homes slated to be built,” he added.