A rendering of the exterior of a home to be built on Midlothian Turnpike this summer using 3D-printing technology
In a world of skyrocketing housing costs, low inventory and countless people in need of an affordable home, Virginia Housing is looking for new ideas. The state agency has, for two years, offered a $500,000 Innovation Demonstration Grant to partners who are willing to push boundaries. The grant is offered on a rolling basis, and this year, it was awarded to a partnership between Virginia Tech, Better Housing Coalition and project:HOMES to build a house with 3D-printing technology that uses concrete.
“The pilot project will be the construction of one 3D-printed house on Midlothian Turnpike,” says Chris Thompson, the director of strategic housing at Virginia Housing. “The printer system is being ordered from Denmark. Our intent is to build the house in August and September and keep the home open for a while for educational tours.
“Ultimately, it will be put on the market and sold to a first-time homebuyer. Then Virginia Tech will own the technology, and we’ll start looking at our new options.”
The use of 3D printing to build durable structures is a new technology that first came to the attention of Virginia Housing in 2019. Essentially, a large-scale printer is programmed with a home’s blueprint, and it reacts by moving around the perimeter and exuding concrete, similar to squeezing toothpaste from a tube. Once the structure is in place, it is outfitted with plumbing and electricity. Both waste and labor costs should be drastically reduced through the use of the 3D printer.
The pilot home will be a one-story structure of about 1,600 square feet.
“For us, this is going to be a learning experience,” Thompson says. “We’re working with Tech to do baseline data collection. We want to look at this from an energy-consumption angle and from a cost-savings and an energy-savings angle.”
A rendering of the interior of a home to be built on Midlothian Turnpike this summer using 3D-printing technology
The printer was scheduled to arrive last month. The machine will be tested off site during the summer, and in September, printing will begin on site on the Richmond side of Midlothian Turnpike. The technical aspects of the project will be overseen by Alquist 3D, and the builder is RMT Construction & Development Group. At the end of the year, the home will be sold by nonprofits project:HOMES and Better Housing Coalition.
Last year, Virginia Housing’s Innovation Demonstration Grant was awarded to the Church Street Housing Development in Martinsville for the construction of 27 modular homes and townhomes. The Martinsville homes are still in the factory phase, with on-site construction expected to begin in August.
Of Virginia Housing, Thompson says, “Our mission is to help provide affordable housing for residents of the commonwealth. That mission evolves into a lot of different resources for homebuyers. We recognize that there’s been a shortage of affordable housing inventory, both for renters and buyers. In the past year, we’ve seen record production, but we still haven’t met the demand.
“Our charge is to work with our community, understand their needs and respond where we can. … I can’t hammer home enough the fact that there is an extreme shortage of housing of all types, particularly affordable housing.”
