3D printed and factory-built homes could help tackle housing crisis

3D printed and factory-built homes could help tackle housing crisis

By JESSE BEDAYN Associated Press/Report for America

DENVER (AP) — As Americans struggle under backbreaking rental prices, builders are turning to innovative ways to churn out more housing, from 3D printing to assembling homes in an indoor factory to using hemp — yes, the marijuana cousin — to make building blocks for walls.

It’s a response to the country’s shortfall of millions of homes that has led to skyrocketing prices, plunging millions into poverty.

“There’s not enough homes to purchase and there’s not enough places to rent. Period,” said Adrianne Todman, the acting secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development under former President Joe Biden.

Businesses and lawmakers are trying to address the U.S. affordable housing crisis by turning to alternative ways to build homes. These include 3D printing houses out of concrete, building homes in a factory and shipping them to their final destination, and even using the hemp plant in construction. (AP video shot by Thomas Peipert)

One way to quickly build more is embrace these types of innovations, Todman said. “I can only imagine what our housing situation would be like now if we could have made a decision to be more aggressive in adopting this type of housing” decades ago.

So what are these new ways of building homes? And can they help reduce the cost of new housing, leading to lower rents?

Factory-built housing put together in a week

In a cavernous, metal hall, Eric Schaefer stood in front of a long row of modular homes that moved through the plant, similar to a car on an assembly line.

At a series of stations, workers lay flooring, erected framing, added roofs and screwed on drywall. Everything from electrical wiring to plumbing to kitchen countertops were in place before the homes were shrink-wrapped and ready to be shipped.

The business in the Colorado Rocky Mountains, Fading West, has pumped out more than 500 homes in its just over three years of operation, each taking just five to seven days to build, even in the coldest winter months, Schaefer said.

Once assembled in the plant, the narrow townhouse-style homes with white trim, balconies and front porches, are about 90% done. At their final destination they are move-in ready within six weeks, Schaefer said.

The company works with towns, counties and housing nonprofits to help address the shortage of affordable homes, mostly for workers who’ve been squeezed out by sky-high prices in ritzy mountain towns.

That includes Eagle, Colorado, not far from the Vail ski resort, where Fading West worked with Habitat for Humanity to install modular homes at affordable rents for teachers and other school district employees. The homes tend to be on the smaller side, but can be multifamily or single family.

“You can build faster. The faster you build — even at a high quality — means the lower the price,” Schaefer said. “We see this as one of the pieces to the puzzle in helping solve the affordable housing crisis.”

There’s a hefty upfront cost to build the factory, and part of the challenge is a lack of state and federal investment, he said. A patchwork of building codes governing how a structure can be built also makes it difficult, requiring changes to the construction depending on the town or county it is being sent to.

Manufactured housing is similar to modular housing, but the units are constructed on a chassis — like a trailer — and they aren’t subject to the same local building codes. That’s part of the reason they are used more broadly across the U.S.

Roughly 100,000 manufactured homes were shipped to states in 2024, up from some 60,000 a decade earlier, according to Census Bureau data. Estimates of modular homes built annually often put them below 20,000.

3D printing is innovative but still ‘a long game’

Yes, there’s technology to 3D print homes.

A computer-controlled robotic arm equipped with a hose and nozzle moves back and forth, oozing lines of concrete, one on top of the other, as it builds up the wall of a home. It can go relatively quickly and form curved walls unlike concrete blocks.

Grant Hamel, CEO and co-founder of VeroTouch, stood inside one of the homes his company built, the wall behind him made out of rolling layers of concrete, distinct to a 3D printer. The technology could eventually reduce labor costs and the time it takes to build an abode, but is farther off than manufactured or modular methods from making a dent in the housing crisis.

It’s “a long game, to start chipping away at those prices at every step of the construction process,” Hamel said.

The 3D printers are expensive, and so are the engineers and other skilled employees needed to run them, said Ali Memari, director of the Pennsylvania Housing Research Center, whose work has partly focused on 3D printing. It’s also not recognized by international building codes, which puts up more red tape.

The technology is also generally restricted to single-story structures, unless traditional building methods are used as well, Memari said

It’s “a technology at its beginning, it has room to grow, especially when it is recognized in code,” Memari said. “The challenges that I mentioned exist, and they have to be addressed by the research community.”

A hemp-and-lime mixture called hempcrete has ‘a bright future’

Hemp — the plant related to marijuana — is being used more and more in the construction of walls.

The hemp is mixed with other materials, most importantly the mineral lime, forming “hempcrete,” a natural insulation that’s mold- and fire-resistant and can act as outer wall, insulation and inner wall.

Hempcrete still requires wood studs to frame the walls, but it replaces three wall-building components with just one, said Memari, also a professor at Penn State University’s Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering. Memari is now helping oversee research into making hempcrete that doesn’t need the wood studs.

As much as a million hemp plants to be used for hempcrete can grow on one acre in a matter of months as opposed to trees, which can take years or decades to grow.

The plant is part of the cannabis family but has far less of the psychoactive component, THC, found in marijuana. In 2018, Congress legalized the production of certain types of hemp. Last year, the International Code Council, which develops international building codes used by all 50 states, adopted hempcrete as an insulation.

Confusion over the legality of growing hemp and the price tag of the machine required to process the plant, called a decorticator, are barriers to hempcrete becoming more widespread in housing construction, Memari said.

Still, he said, “hempcrete has a bright future.”

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Associated Press video journalist Thomas Peipert contributed to this report from Buena Vista, Colorado.

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Bedayn is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.

More evacuations as wildfires burn in the Carolinas. Forecasts aren’t encouraging for firefighters

More evacuations as wildfires burn in the Carolinas. Forecasts aren’t encouraging for firefighters

More people have been asked to leave their homes in the North Carolina and South Carolina mountains as wildfires spread and the forecast for the rest of the week is not encouraging — dry and windy.

A half-dozen large fires are burning in the Blue Ridge Mountains, putting a lot more gray into the landscape and spreading smoke into places like Greenville.

Millions of fallen trees from September’s Hurricane Helene are both providing fuel for the wildfires and blocking the logging roads and paths firefighters use to fight the blazes and create fire breaks.

Dry conditions, wind and trees downed by Hurricane Helene fueled wildfires in North Carolina and South Carolina, where evacuation orders were in effect Tuesday. (AP Video)

Firefighters have managed to save most of the structures near the fires. Only one injury has been reported — a firefighter in North Carolina got his leg caught under a tree, officials said. At least 15 square miles (39 square kilometers) have burned.

Discouraging forecasts

There is rain in the forecast for the weekend, but it isn’t the kind of soaking downpour that can knock a fire out on its own, said National Weather Service meteorologist Ashley Rehnberg in Greer, South Carolina.

“Hopefully that will at least calm things down briefly,” Rehnberg said.

The bright spot in the forecast for the next week is there is no especially dangerous day where the winds and the dry weather reach potentially disastrous levels like in Los Angeles in January or Gatlinburg, Tennessee, in 2016.

Forestry agencies in North Carolina and South Carolina are already figuring out how to rotate teams of firefighters into and out of the mountains for what could be a long fight.

“Burn bans are in place and people need to follow them,” Rehnberg said. “Even if we do get rain, the weather is going to continue to be a problem as far as we can forecast.”

South Carolina fire update

South Carolina fire officials called for their first round of evacuations Tuesday night. Two fires are burning — a larger one inside Table Rock State Park in Pickens County that has burned 3.6 square miles (9.3 square kilometers) and another one on Persimmon Ridge in Greenville County has burned 1.6 square miles (4 square kilometers).

The fires are about 8 miles (12.5 kilometers) apart and winds are strong enough that authorities decided to evacuate the area between the two fires.

North Carolina fire update

About two dozen homes and outbuildings have been destroyed in Polk County, spokesperson Kellie Cannon said in the latest update.

Three fires have burned at least 9.6 square miles (25 square kilometers) in Polk County and in neighboring Henderson County.

Late Tuesday, a wildfire started in far western North Carolina not far from Bryson City. Police were evacuating some people as the fire spread to nearly 1 square mile (1.6 square kilometers).

Authorities tell people to stop burning

The fires in South Carolina have been caused by humans.

Authorities from local fire chiefs all the way to South Carolina’s governor are urging people to heed burn bans in both states and stop setting fires to burn garbage or at campsites.

“We have people going out in the woods and in their backyards and starting fires when the wind is blowing and everything is dry,” South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster said. “We just have to use common sense. People get out in nature and they forget how dangerous it can be.

North Carolina government makes big tax revenues quickly from first year of sports betting

North Carolina government makes big tax revenues quickly from first year of sports betting

By GARY D. ROBERTSON Associated Press

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — North Carolina government cashed in early when it came to reaping fiscal benefits from authorized sports wagering in the ninth-largest state.

A report presented Wednesday to the North Carolina State Lottery Commission, which regulates the betting, says the state expects to have collected $131.3 million in taxes from sports betting operations for the first full year of operations through March 10.

That amount goes well beyond estimates of state legislative researchers as the bill worked its way through the General Assembly that enacted it in 2023. They had projected tax revenues could reach $100 million annually within five years. The calculation is based on the law’s 18% rate upon gross wagering revenue, which is essentially betting revenue minus paid winnings.

On March 11, 2024, licensed operators began taking bets on smartphones and computers under the 2023 state law permitting and regulating such gambling. At the time, North Carolina became the 30th state to offer mobile sports better, along with the District of Columbia.

The windfall is connected to big betting. For the first full year of North Carolina operations, over $6.8 billion in bets were made, resulting in $729.3 million in gross wagering revenue for the eight licensees, according to the commission report.

“It was a very successful year in my opinion,” Sterl Carpenter, the lottery’s chief business development officer who helped get sports wagering off the ground, told the commission. “Things went extremely well.”

“I would say that we are very encouraged by the results,” commissioner Cari Boyce said.

With a population of 11 million, North Carolina had been considered an attractive market for interactive wagering companies seeking to open. Before the law was implemented, sports gambling was legal in North Carolina only at three casinos operated by two American Indian tribes.

Under the law, registered customers within the state’s borders can bet on professional, college or Olympic-style sports. The law allows for future in-person wagering through sportsbooks beyond those already located at the tribal casinos.

Close to $500 million in the sports wagering revenues during the past year were considered “promotional wagers” — incentives for new customers offered by the companies once an initial bet is made. With those amounts removed, the complete months with the highest betting totals were November, December and January — a period that features college and professional football playoffs, as well as college basketball and pro hockey and hoops.

The tax revenues collected partly go to athletic departments at most University of North Carolina system schools, amateur sports initiatives and gambling addiction education and treatment.

Grandma’s Nougat

Grandma’s Nougat

Grandma’s Nougat

Photo by Getty Images

Grandma’s Nougat Recipe from Meaningful Eats

Prep time: 30 minutes

Cooking time: N/A

Serving size: 15 servings

Ingredients

  • 2 cups granulated sugar
  • 2 ½ cups white corn syrup
  • ¼ teaspoon salt
  • ⅓ cup egg whites (from 3 large eggs)
  • 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
  • 6 tablespoons butter (room temperature and cut into small pieces)
  • 2 teaspoons flour (I use gluten-free flour)
  • 1 cup salted peanuts or nut of choice (optional)

Directions

  1. Line a 9×13 pan (or quarter sheet pan) with parchment paper. Lightly grease with non-stick cooking spray and set aside.
  2. Melt the sugar, corn syrup, and salt together in a large, heavy-bottomed pot over medium heat. (A stainless steel pot works best. An enameled dutch oven pot will make the temperature harder to control and can lead to overcooking.)
  3. Bring the syrup mixture to a boil and boil until it reaches 244F. Wash down the sides of the pot to remove any sugar crystals if needed, but there’s no need to stir once it’s boiling.
  4. Meanwhile, add the egg whites to the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the whisk attachment. Beat on medium-high speed for 2 minutes until starting to thicken/foam.
  5. When the syrup mixture reaches 244F, slowly pour in ⅓ of the syrup while mixing on low speed. Pour the syrup in very slowly and carefully and be sure it’s being mixed the whole time.
  6. Put the remaining syrup in the pot back on the stove and cook over medium heat until it reaches 264F.
  7. With the mixer running on low, pour the rest of the syrup (slowly and carefully) into the egg whites.
  8. Continue mixing on medium-high speed for 5 minutes, or until the mixture is stiff and starts to clump around the whisk. It won’t form completely stiff peaks but will thicken quite a bit.
  9. With the mixer running on low, stir in the vanilla, and ½ the butter and flour. Mix in the rest of the butter/flour, then stir in the nuts.
  10. Pour into the prepared pan and smooth into an even layer. Sprinkle with more nuts if desired. Allow to cool for at least 4 hours and preferably overnight.
  11. Slice into pieces with a greased knife. You may have to grease the knife in-between slices. Wrap with candy wrappers if desired, or store in an airtight container between pieces of wax paper or parchment so the pieces don’t stick to each other. Enjoy!
March 26th 2025

March 26th 2025

Thought of the Day

Photo by Getty Images

Your past does not equal your future.

North Carolina Senate majority leader to resign from chamber

North Carolina Senate majority leader to resign from chamber

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — A top lieutenant to North Carolina Senate leader Phil Berger announced on Tuesday his resignation from his Senate seat, creating a leadership vacancy as the Senate enters a more intense work period this year.

Republican Senate Majority Leader Paul Newton is retiring effective Wednesday evening “to pursue an opportunity outside of state government,” according to a statement from Senate Republicans. His specific plans weren’t immediately released.

Newton’s departure will mean that Republicans in the 34th Senate District will choose someone to fill his seat through the end of 2026. Senate Republicans also will have to meet to pick a new majority leader.

The majority leader presides at caucus meetings in which the majority party discusses policy issues and votes and is usually closely allied with the Senate president pro tempore — the position held by Berger.

Newton, 64, a former Duke Energy state president in North Carolina from Cabarrus County, joined the Senate in 2017 and was elected by his GOP colleagues after the 2022 elections to the majority leadership post.

As a majority leader or a committee chair, Newton helped get enacted laws that extended the GOP’s conservative tax policies; eliminated the three-day grace period for mail-in absentee ballots postmarked by the day of the election; and set greenhouse gas reduction mandates on electric power plants operated by Duke Energy.

“It has been an honor of a lifetime to serve the people of Cabarrus County for nearly a decade,” Newton said. “During that time, I’ve been able to play a small role in so many consequential pieces of legislation that have made an incredible impact on the lives of North Carolinians.”

In the statement, Berger called Newton a “valued voice and leader” who “provided a calm presence and wise counsel to many legislators during his time in Raleigh. He was always willing to tackle the tough subjects and never wavered from his convictions.”

The Senate’s bill-filing deadline was Tuesday. The Senate aims to approve a two-year state government budget proposal next month.

Wildfires in North and South Carolina fueled by drought, wind and fallen trees from Hurricane Helene

Wildfires in North and South Carolina fueled by drought, wind and fallen trees from Hurricane Helene

Dry conditions, wind and trees downed by Hurricane Helene fueled wildfires in North Carolina and South Carolina, where evacuation orders were in effect Tuesday.

About 80 miles (129 kilometers) west of Charlotte, North Carolina, officials ordered mandatory evacuations for roughly 165 properties in rural Polk County. Three fires there have burned at least 9 square miles (23 square kilometers). The North Carolina Forest Service says two of the fires are uncontained as of Monday night.

The Black Cove Fire is one of the larger blazes. Officials said a downed power line sparked that fire, but the causes of the other two fires are under investigation.

Neighboring Henderson County issued voluntary evacuation orders and opened an emergency shelter. Volunteer fire departments were on standby, Henderson County spokesperson Mike Morgan told WLOS-TV.

“Especially near some of the homes where if the fire did jump, we can be there to help protect those homes,” Morgan said. “We’re here to monitor the situation very closely.”

Two fires were burning in the mountains of South Carolina. The fires in Table Rock State Park and nearby Persimmon Ridge have burned a combined 2.3 square miles (5.9 square kilometers), the South Carolina Forestry Commission said. Officials said both fires were ignited by human activity and neither were contained as of Monday night.

No injuries were reported, and no structures were imminently threatened as of Monday night, but voluntary evacuations were issued for about 100 homes over the weekend. On Tuesday morning, the forestry commission updated an earlier announcement to say no evacuations were planned near the Persimmon Ridge Fire, but residents were urged to be prepared to leave their homes if an evacuation is suggested in the future.

“The weather over the next few days remains concerning, as relative humidities are expected to remain very low, and the forecasted wind speeds will still be conducive to spreading the fire,” the forestry commission said.

Dry weather and millions of trees knocked down by Hurricane Helene last year are creating a long and active fire season in the Carolinas, according to North Carolina State University forestry and environmental resources professor Robert Scheller. Scheller predicted this busy fire season if the region saw dry weather after the hurricane.

“Helene just dropped tons of fuel on the ground,” Scheller said. “Then these flash droughts allow that fuel to dry out very fast.”

Despite recent rain, most of the Carolinas are abnormally dry or experiencing a moderate drought, according to federal monitors.

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This story has been corrected to show that officials were not recommending evacuations near the Persimmon Ridge Fire, but residents should be prepared to leave their homes if one is suggested.

Classic Lobster Newburg

Classic Lobster Newburg

Classic Lobster Newburg

Photo by Getty Images

Classic Lobster Newburg Recipe from The Suburban Soapbox

Prep time: 10 minutes

Cooking time: 15 minutes

Serving size: 4 servings

Ingredients

  • 5 tbsp butter
  • 2 tbsp flour
  • 2 cups half and half
  • 5 large egg yolks, lightly beaten
  • 1 lb cooked lobster meat, cut into bite sized pieces
  • 3 tbsp cognac
  • 1 lemon, juice and zest
  • 1/4 tsp nutmeg
  • 1/4 tsp kosher salt
  • 4 frozen puff pastry shells, or toast points

Directions

  1. Bake the puff pastry shells according to package instructions or toast bread then cut into triangles. Set aside.
  2. Melt the butter in a large skillet over medium heat.
  3. Whisk in the flour and cook for 2-3 minutes until golden brown. The mixture will have the consistency of wet sand.
  4. Slowly whisk in the half and half cooking until slightly thickened. Do not boil.
  5. Add a few tablespoons of the cream mixture to the eggs and whisk to temper the eggs.
  6. Slowly whisk the egg mixture into the cream and turn the heat to low. Continue stirring until smooth and creamy.
  7. Stir in the lobster, cognac, lemon juice, zest, nutmeg and salt.
  8. Serve the lobster newburg in the puff pastry shells or on top of the toast points. Garnish with parsley, if desired.
March 25th 2025

March 25th 2025

Thought of the Day

Photo by Getty Images

Don’t cling to things because everything is impermanent.

Military veterans are becoming the face of Trump’s government cuts and Democrats’ resistance

Military veterans are becoming the face of Trump’s government cuts and Democrats’ resistance

By STEPHEN GROVES Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — As congressional lawmakers scramble to respond to President Donald Trump’s slashing of the federal government, one group is already taking a front and center role: military veterans.

From layoffs at the Department of Veterans Affairs to a Pentagon purge of archives that documented diversity in the military, veterans have been acutely affected by Trump’s actions. And with the Republican president determined to continue slashing the federal government, the burden will only grow on veterans, who make up roughly 30% of the over 2 million civilians who work for the federal government and often tap government benefits they earned with their military service.

“At a moment of crisis for all of our veterans, the VA’s system of health care and benefits has been disastrously and disgracefully put on the chopping block by the Trump administration,” said Sen. Richard Blumenthal, the top Democrat on the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee, at a news conference last week.

Blumenthal on Monday announced a series of so-called shadow hearings by Senate Democrats to spotlight how veterans are being impacted. Blumenthal invited VA Secretary Doug Collins to the first meeting next week, though the Cabinet secretary is under no compulsion to attend and is unlikely to appear at an unofficial proceeding.

Most veterans voted for Trump last year — nearly 6 in 10, according to AP Votecast, a nationwide survey of more than 120,000 voters. Yet congressional Republicans are standing in support of Trump’s goals even as they encounter fierce pushback in their home districts. At a series of town halls last week, veterans angrily confronted Republican members as they defended the cuts made under Trump adviser Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency.

“Do your job!” Jay Carey, a military veteran, yelled at Republican Rep. Chuck Edwards at a town hall in North Carolina.

“I’m a retired military officer,” an attendee at another forum in Wyoming told Republican Rep. Harriet Hageman before questioning whether DOGE had actually discovered any “fraud.”

Although Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson advised his members to skip the town halls and claimed that they were being filled with paid protesters, some Republicans were still holding them and trying to respond to the criticism.

“It looks radical, but it’s not. I call it stewardship, in my opinion,” Republican Rep. Gus Bilirakis of Florida said on a tele-town hall. “I think they’re doing right by the American taxpayer. And I support that principle of DOGE.”

Still, some Republicans have expressed unease with the seemingly indiscriminate firings of veterans, especially when they have not been looped in on the administration’s plans. At a town hall on Friday, Texas Republican Rep. Dan Crenshaw told the audience, “We’re learning about this stuff at the speed of light, the way you are. I think there’s been some babies thrown out with the bath water here, but we’re still gathering information on it.”

Crenshaw, a former Navy SEAL, added, “If you’re doing a job that we need you to do, you’re doing it well, yeah, we’ve got to fight for you.”

The Republican chair of the House Veterans Affairs Committee, Rep. Mike Bost, assured listeners on a tele-town hall last week that he and Collins, the VA Cabinet secretary, are talking regularly. As the VA implements plans to cut roughly 80,000 jobs, Bost has said he is watching the process closely, but he has expressed support and echoed Collins’ assurances that veterans’ health care and benefits won’t be slashed.

“They’ve cut a lot, but understand this: Essential jobs are not being cut,” Bost said, but then added that his office was helping alert the VA when people with essential jobs had in fact been terminated.

Two federal judges this month ordered the Trump administration to rehire the probationary employees who were let go in the mass firings. At the VA, some of those employees have now been put on administrative leave, but a sense of dread and confusion is still hanging over much of the federal workforce.

“We’re all kind of wondering what’s next,” said Dan Foster, a Washington state Army veteran who lost his job when the VA canceled a contract supporting a program that educates service members on how to access their benefits and VA programs.

Others are angry they have been portrayed as deadweight and cut from jobs they felt played a direct role in helping veterans get health care.

“For somebody to go on the news and say we are incompetent or lazy — that is just false,” said Future Zhou, an Army veteran who had a job managing medical supply inventories for operating rooms at the VA facility in Puget Sound, Washington, before she was fired in February.

As Democrats search for their political footing and a rallying point to unify them, they have zeroed in on the cause of protecting veterans. In both the House and the Senate, Democrats have introduced legislation that would shield veterans from the mass layoffs. And when Trump spoke to Congress this month, many lawmakers invited veterans as their guests.

“They are outraged,” Sen. Tammy Duckworth, an Illinois Democrat who is an Iraq War veteran and former assistant secretary at the VA. “They said Donald Trump promised to watch out for them. And the first thing he does is fire them.”

Democrats are already pressing their Republican colleagues to show their support for veterans. In negotiations to allow passage of a Republican-backed government funding bill this month, Democrats secured a vote to amend the package to include language that would protect veterans from the federal layoffs. But it failed on party lines in part because the last-minute change would have ensured that Congress missed the deadline to avert a shutdown.

With an eye on the midterm elections, VoteVets, a left-leaning veterans’ advocacy group, is already launching video ads that feature veterans sharing their stories of being fired and accusing congressional members of doing “absolutely nothing.” The ads are directed to five potential swing districts held by Republicans who are veterans themselves.

Sen. Ruben Gallego, an Arizona Democrat who is also a veteran, said he was unsure whether veterans would shift their political allegiance.

But he said it is at least clear veterans are “pissed.”

Gallego said there’s an opportunity for Democrats to hammer home the message that “Elon Musk and his buddies would rather just deal with the bottom line and try to save billions of dollars so they can have more tax cuts at the expense of veterans.”

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This story has been corrected to show the town halls were last week, not this week.

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Associated Press writers Meg Kinnard in Chapin, S.C., and Kate Payne in Tallahassee, Fla., contributed.

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