Styrofoam waste from surfboard building usually ends up in the landfill. And there’s a huge need for fire-resistant housing materials on Maui.
Those two problems might seem unrelated, but Surf Block Maui has come up with a solution for both.
“About eight years ago, I opened the dumpster at our office, and it's just full of scraps of Styrofoam, or EPS, and I thought we could be building stuff with this,” said David Sellers
He's the principal architect at Hawaii Off-Grid, the parent company of Surf Block Maui. His office is in Haʻikū, right next to a couple of surfboard factories.
It turns out the material he found in the dumpster is perfect for creating building blocks — and a partnership with the surfboard companies was born.
“We started kind of slowly, working on developing our own system, and then about two years ago, we got really serious. We worked with the County of Maui, they had a grant to try to make sustainable building products on island. We worked with them, started our initial prototyping, and then the fire happened. So everything kind of stopped, of course, we shifted gears.”
Hawaii Off-Grid worked with Family Life Center on design and financial assistance for ʻOhana Hope Village, a temporary housing community for fire-displaced families.
Now, they’ve turned back to the blocks, and momentum is growing.
“They are made from surfboard waste that is recycled here on island and cast into blocks, and we're actually building houses that are fire resistant, mold and mildew resistant, termite proof, up to 500 times stronger than a typical two-by-four framed wall,” Sellers said.
In Olowalu outside Lahaina, the third home made from Surf Block is taking shape, expected to be completed this summer.
It has about 1,000 square feet of living space, which takes around 300 blocks to construct.
"From one manufacturer that's next door to our office, we can build 10 to 20 houses a year, depending on the size,” Sellers explained.
“So it's not that we want to build every house out of Surf Block, but what we'd like to do is build all the houses that we can out of scrap and waste EPS so that it's not going into landfill."
The 1-by-5-foot blocks are made by grinding up the scrap Styrofoam, mixing it with a little cement and additives, and pouring it into a mold. Each block weighs about 40 pounds. After installation, the interior tube structure within the blocks is filled with concrete for stability.
“It can save people money and it can give them a very resilient home,” he said. “So when we do have natural disasters, fire, hurricanes, we will be in a better situation.”
Surf Block is similar in use to cinder blocks but lower cost. Site foreman Levi Decker said it’s much easier to work with.
“Ultimately, it goes together really quick and easy, and it's something that people, even with not a lot of technical construction skills, can actually do.”
With a shortage of construction workers in Hawaiʻi and the cost of building supplies rising, locally-made materials are looking better and better.
Roseann Freitas, the CEO of the Building Industry Association of Hawaiʻi, said uncertainty about the 25% federal tariffs being considered on imported building materials is already affecting the industry.
“This kind of back and forth, tariff one day, no tariff the next, is already having an impact on the pricing, because they're trying to anticipate what that's going to be,” Freitas said.
“So you're starting to see some products will start to have an increase in price as they wait to see the fallout. So all of those factors are going to impact Lahaina, because you're trying to rebuild a lot of homes at one time.”
Freitas said that lumber from Canada — where a majority of the supply originates — as well as drywall materials from Mexico, along with steel and aluminum, would all be affected if the tariffs move forward.
As Lahaina homeowners weigh whether they’ll be able to afford their rebuilds, local products like Surf Block could be a bright spot.
Sellers said Surf Block currently has two homes going through the county permitting process to rebuild in Lahaina. He hopes his company can be part of the solution, especially when it comes to bringing Lahaina families home.
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