A wooden wall possesses both advantages and disadvantages.
"While wood accounts for 46 percent of industrial raw materials (by weight) worldwide, it uses only 4 percent of the energy required to process raw materials into useful products," asserts the website, Newfloridahome.com, making a strong case for the use of wood in building inside and outside of homes. Wooden walls have numerous distinct characteristics, many of which are positive, making wood a wise choice as a building material.
Fire Resistant
While it may not seem to be true, a solid wood wall offers you standard protection against fires. According to the Rondoni Group, a company that specializes in building wooden walls and other types of ecological construction, "The wall's wooden core contributes to increase the duration for which a passive fire protection system can withstand a standard fire resistance test." You can make a wooden wall even more fire resistant by applying or spraying a special stain to it.
Earthy and Natural
Wooden walls, consisting of a material taken straight from nature, give any room or yard and inherently natural feel, particularly when you leave the walls unpainted. The grain of the wood surrounds the room, making it almost feel as if you're in a cabin in the woods. A wooden wall is versatile and can take on a variety of looks. For example, you can stain it to enhance its natural hue or give it a slightly different shade.
Moisture Vulnerable
Regardless of whether your wooden wall is inside or outside, you'll need to apply a protective finish to it that will help it expel moisture. Wood is a very strong and durable material, but water and other forms of moisture can cause it to rot and weaken.
Renewable
While some might think of wooden walls as bad for the environment, as they consist of cut down trees, people too quickly forget that trees are a renewable resource. A wooden wall consists of a natural resource that humans can constantly use and re-create. According to Newfloridahome.com, "nonrenewable resources such as iron ore are mined on a permanently depleting basis." Wood is also biodegradable, thus preferable to man-made walls that don't have this attribute.
Insulation
Wood has a natural ability to store heat, making wooden walls ideal for homes to keep energy and heating costs down in the wintertime. According to Newfloridahome.com, "It is the best insulator of all structural building materials, thus conserving finite fossil fuels and coal by requiring less energy to heat and cool a home built with wood."
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