Since I did not make it to the IBS product show in Las Vegas, I am wondering what is the latest with Strata International Group's new building system (expanded polystyrene and glass fiber reinforced concrete).  Does anyone know if this company is ready for prime time throughout the nation?  Does anyone have any thoughts about this new system?

I did visit the show and I have toured their original 2 room demonstration house along with the plant where all of the ICC tests were run. Since I am less than 100 miles from Phoenix, this is relatively easy to do. I have watched their progress for several years and the impression that I got from the show was that the representatives were highly interested in selling licenses to builders who would like to use the system, but they had no representative utility bills from the three homes (Fountain Valley, Payson, and the 2 room demo) or the condos to show what the product can do. One comment that I heard was that the folks in Payson have lived in their home for 1 1/2 years and have yet to turn on the heat or the a/c. This home reportedly has 12" thick walls. Payson is nearly 5,000' elevation in northern Arizona. I don't put a lot of credence in that type of comment. They did tell me that the most critical thing in the construction was the 'shooting' of the concrete. I plan to build soon in the Tucson area, but I'm going to have to see more progress from them before I would commit to their system. I'm probably more comfortable today with the steel stud foam panel system from www.energypanelsystems.com who are ICC approved and located in Tucson. We have another company here in Prescott called www.gbsi-step.com who has also patented their system and is trying to land big jobs anywhere in the world, not necessarily in the US. I'm sure that some of this is to satisfy their investors as they have a lot of stock holders. At 71 years of age, I'm more interested in what I can build here, now, and live in before I die! glen at ccim dot net

Here is a pic of the IBS display in Vegas. http://strataus.com/