The average lifespan of a U.S. home is estimated at 50-63 years. With a changing climate, it’s fair to ask what effect a shift to more resilient home construction will have on longevity.
The emphasis on resiliency is easy to understand. Extreme weather, concerns about home insurance, and worries from home buyers describe a marketplace shifting toward more durable construction methods.
“Why build a home that lasts only a few decades? Why not engineer it so it lasts five-to-10 decades?” asks Matthew Trimble, principal designer for Saint-Gobain Research and their CertainTeed One Precision Assemblies (OPA) division, a leading panelized building system manufacturer.
Challenging Conditions
It’s tough to build for the ages when you’re up against labor shortages, supply chain uncertainty, and weather delays. The U.S. Census Bureau now reports home permit-to-completion time is almost three months longer today than it was in 2015.
Suppose you could build a resilient, weather-hardened home by reducing the delivery schedule by up to 5 months? No design compromises. No labor or material issues. Just a high-performance building envelope assembled in days … not weeks or months.
Welcome to OPA panelized home construction, the proven offsite building method engineered for long-term climate resilience.
Design Freedom
“When people think about offsite construction, they often think of manufactured housing,” says Evan Molony, senior research engineer at CertainTeed. “Manufactured housing is often associated with standardized design.”
OPA panelized home construction is engineered to exacting standards to fit nearly any design, whether it was initially intended to be panelized.
That’s just the beginning of how panelized resilience and versatility offer home builders a proven construction alternative:
- Performance Predictability. It’s tough to test envelope performance with materials from different manufacturers. How can you be sure they all get along well together? “That puts you at the mercy of different warranties from different companies and the finger-pointing that can produce,” Trimble says. “We harmonize panel composition with CertainTeed tested and branded quality for more predictable, enduring performance.”
- Quality Assurance and Project Optimization. “We offer a range of panel options and insulation levels” says Molony, “We match panel design to jobsite climate conditions as well as local code requirements and builder/homeowner preferences, which could be a beachfront, mountainside or urban setting.” Every panel is 3D modeled and fabricated with CNC equipment to a mandatory 1/16” tolerance. That precision allows for exceptional air- and water-tight panel sealing by CertainTeed OPA assembly crews at the jobsite.
- Water Testing. “Water is what ultimately kills buildings,” Molony says, noting they aggressively simulate adverse moisture conditions in all target climate zones and verify those findings with field sensors. “We embedded about 50 sensors in the first panelized houses we built,” says Molony. “Even today the sensors continuously gather data that we match against the computer model and weather records. It enables us to make confident performance statements.”
- Code Compliance. Local code requirements are baked into panel design and fabrication. Recently released ICC-ES Evaluation Report ESR-5311 documents and verifies compliance with IRC 2024, 2021, 2018 and 2015 codes across all CertainTeed OPA wall, floor and roof/ceiling panels. “Permitting is even easier for builders,” Trimble says.
A changing climate and the risks that come with it puts a new focus on resilient construction. Today, it’s good to know panelized construction offers builders and buyers a proven way forward to long-term ownership value, sustainability, and weather security.
Learn More about how CertainTeed OPA can help you deliver a better home faster.
