Soybeans - The House That Soy Built

The researcher and his wife, Vaishali, are building a new home in Brookings, and they want their contractors to use as many soy-based products as possible. The couple's house will be lined with energy-efficient soy-based spray foam insulation. Underneath their carpeting will be padding made from Urethane Soy System's products. Patel is even working with a countertop manufacturer to make a product based on — you guessed it — soy materials. "The countertops are a fairly new project. I'm going to work with our customer on that and see if we can have something in time for our home." Patel, a five-year employee of Urethane Soy Systems, says the company converts soybean oil into a polyol, which is a chemical used in the polyurethane industry to make polyurethane plastic. Polyol has traditionally been made from petroleum-based oil. "With our technology, we can convert soybean oil into a polyol that could be used for any of those applications," he said. Patel said USS researchers are working on a wide range of products because polyurethane is a versatile polymer. "It's a really good plastic, and you can make various applications from that," he said. "If you consider polyurethane itself, you can make coatings, paints, and a major use is foam, like the cushioning you sit on every day...USNews