Idaho’s innovative Hempitecture isn’t just blowing smoke.
While CBD-related products still command the greatest portion of the legal hemp market, industrial users are catching up. And no, should you go all environmental and insulate your home with carbon-sequestering hemp, it will not reek of weed, not in and of itself.
“It actually smells a little like graham crackers,” says Tommy Gibbons, co-founder and chief innovation officer of Hempitecture, an organic materials company based in Jerome, Idaho. “For the most part,” he says, “it’s odorless.”
Hempitecture is the first U.S. manufacturer of hemp-based batt insulation and, according to Gibbons, the largest buyer of North American hemp fiber, which it sources from Idaho and Montana.
Gibbons and his fellow co-founder Matthew “Mattie” Mead hit upon HempWool, their trademarked hemp fiber insulation product, after an early flirtation with hempcrete as an alternative base building material. That seemed like a good idea at the time, but less so in practice than in theory, they learned along the way.
“Hempcrete,” says Gibbons, “is overhyped. It has a lot of challenges and it’s not a great fit for how homes are built. People like to talk about hempcrete, but they like to build with hemp wool. It’s just much simpler and more similar to how the construction industry typically insulates.”
Crafting insulation in Jerome, Idaho.
Photo courtesy of Hempitecture
Down With Hemp in B.C.
Residential developer Karin Eger-Blenk is trying out hemp insulation at Wilden, a 3,000-home project in Kelowna, British Columbia. She believes it’s a match for the development’s orientation toward sustainability.
“Traditional fiberglass insulation has a very heavy carbon footprint, so I asked my construction team, ‘Is there anything we can do about it?’ They came across someone who knew about hemp,” Eger-Blenk tells Site Selection, “and I just said, ‘Let’s do it.’ ”
The added cost to a million-dollar model home was $10,000 over traditional fiberglass. The potential appeal, Eger-Blenk believes, is worth the investment.
“Among other things,” she says, “it’s healthier. There’s less toxins being emitted from the walls versus rock wool or fiberglass. We had an open house, and people get it. We’ll be working with hemp a lot more in the future.”
It’s for reasons such as these that Gibbons sees increasing potential in Hempitecture’s HempWool offering.
“People want to get away from plastics and synthetics,” he says, “and they’re worried about off-gassing from spray foams. If you had asked me why people are willing to pay more for our product, I first would have predicted sustainability. But the data shows the majority is health focused.”
Break on Through
Hempitecture stood up its initial 20,000-sq.-ft. manufacturing facility in Jerome in 2022. As a measure of both its success and potential, the company recently cut the ribbon on a 33,000-sq.-ft. expansion that runs on renewable energy. New equipment is arriving to fire-proof the product to commercial standards.
“At that point,” says Gibbons, “it’s game on. The commercial industry will be able to adopt us instantaneously, and it’s going to translate into a lot more volume.”
The company is expanding into other applications. In addition to building materials and packaging insulation, Hempitecture is targeting furniture and upholstery and sees massive potential in automotive. In October, the company was awarded an $8.42 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy to support a new facility in Rogersville, Tennessee, in the heart of the Southeast’s automotive sector. The grant has been paused by the Trump administration. Gibbons remains optimistic.
“Honestly, I feel like we’ll make it through. It’s not like it’s a wind farm that’s trying to do something crazy. We are a domestic materials manufacturer that hopefully makes America more competitive. But,” he concedes, “that’s not for us to decide. Projects like ours need to match the current administration’s objectives.”
