PHRC Meeting Attendance

The Pennsylvania Housing Research Center collaboratively engages with the residential construction industry to catalyze advancements in homebuilding through education, training, innovation, research, and dissemination.

The Pennsylvania Housing Research Center, or PHRC, as it is now called, owes its existence to the generosity of Mr. Bernard (“Bernie”) Hankin and his family in 1979. Mr. Bernard Hankin saw that residential construction, while comprising nearly two-thirds of the building business in the US, was underrepresented within research institutions in North America. He sought to lead the way toward including "non-engineered" buildings, such as housing, in a formal research program at Penn State. Mr. Bernard Hankin and his family funded a $1,000,000 endowment that was originally called the "Bernard Hankin Professorship in Residential Building Construction," and was renamed in 1988 as the "Bernard and Henrietta Hankin Chair in Residential Building Construction". As former Hankin Chair, Eric Burnett, states, "the endowment of the Bernard and Henrietta Hankin Chair in Residential Construction was an initiative of considerable foresight." The goal of this position was to further engineering excellence in the homebuilding industry through teaching, research, technology transfer and public service.

Currently overseen by Dr. Ali M. Memari - Architectural Engineering Department & Civil and Environmental Engineering Department - Hankin Chair; Director of the PHRC and lead by Brian Wolfgang, Associate Director.  The Pennsylvania Housing Research Center (PHRC) operates an Industry Advisory Council (IAC) that helps generate ideas for PHRC projects, as well as reviews and prioritizes projects. The IAC formally approves the PHRC initiatives and projects to be pursued that are to receive funds provided to the PHRC by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania through Act 157 of 2006 permit fee.

I have held an IAC seat since 2022.  

During our most recent meeting, we discussed the upcoming code changes in PA, heard from Dr. Memari about his research using hemp to create concrete, subfloor and other building materials, received a planning update for the upcoming PHRC Conference in State College and a update from the Penn State students participating in the NAHB student competition.

The hemp presentation was particularly interesting due to its carbon capturing and sustainable harvesting practices.  Ideally, these eco-friendly options would come with a cost neutral impact but unfortunately new technologies often cost more until they are adopted.  I look forward to future updates about this research.

The future code changes are also of particular interest as we look ahead and think of how we will have to change the ways we build homes to meet future codes.  At Biltbold, we have developed a practice of changing one or two components per build to determine what works the best and has the greatest impact over waiting and making all of the changes at once.  

I look forward to continuing to participate with this great organization and contribute towards code changes in the improvement of the home building technology used in our industry.