Minnesota is the first US state on the path to adopting the newest official residential building codes featuring plant-based building materials after a July 15, 2025 hearing in St. Paul.
The state’s Technical Advisory Group (TAG) to the Construction Codes Advisory Council approved adoption of Appendix BL (Hemp-lime “Hempcrete”) and Appendix BJ (Strawbale Construction) of the 2024 International Residential Codes (IRC).
The nine-member TAG group voted 8-1 in favor of hempcrete and 7-2 in favor of strawbale, said advocates who had to appear before the advisory board twice with significant revisions to finally get approval.
“When we walked out of the hearing we were hugging and high-fiving and screaming,” Danny Desjarlais, head of the hempcrete team at the Lower Sioux Community in southwestern Morton, MN told HempBuild Mag.