Query:

After doing my homework, I believe the best green building standard is the ultra-efficient Passive House. That said, I know Passive House focus’ mainly on energy use (or conservation rather). Because designing and building a house is a complicated and involved process, I want to consider a full scope of ‘green’ while I’m at it. What else should I have in mind while I’m talking to designers and builders?

Answer:

Great Question, an enormous question, but a good one.  Let’s begin with the feasibility and design process, knowing your goals before pen ever hits paper is key.  An excellent place to begin the establishment of these goals can often be researching and selecting a recognized certification or standard to certify your project under, such as Passive House, LEED for Home, Living building challenge, Built Green, and Energy Star, for example.  Hiring the right professional designer with a much deeper background than designing to any certification is extremely relevant, but a sustainable approach is really only supported and quantified by third party documentation and review.

The quickest route to a “Green” project is through reducing operational energy (conservation essentially) my preference, for reasons of cost benefit, comfort, and longevity is Passive House, but this is just a very big piece of the pie, not the whole pie, by any means.  For a truly comprehensively sustainable project there is a lot more than just efficiency, for example, reducing potable water consumption, using durable, low emitting, recycled, locally sourced materials, non invasive and native landscaping. Some certifications are broader than others, for example a LEED for Home project I designed recognized the relationship of the site to a greater community, bus lines, parks, proximity to amenities, this reduces the dependency on driving and takes better advantage of an existing infrastructure thus encouraging a lower carbon footprint on a daily basis.  LEED for Home also awards more points for a small home than a large home, the smallest home that effectively meets your needs is always the most environmentally conscious choice.

As I mention above picking the right certification for your project is a great place to begin, and I can’t stress enough how hiring the right team to support that with experience and creativity is equally as potent. For example, not every choice on a checklist makes sense for every home, only experience can judge this, and conversely not every choice that can affect the greater impact of a home will be addressed by any single certification.  For example, I try to build a great deal of  flexibility into my designs  which offers the homeowners the greatest freedom over time as their family and needs change; with the structure in place, the house naturally evolves with the family. Invest time and resources in enduring beauty and design, something that is valuable by its design is better cared for, and so becomes as much a part of sustainability as longevity, energy consumption and social equity. Put something on the planet worthy of care, and it will be cared for.

The House that Saved the World is a thirteen part production featuring  Eco-Home Builders that are breaking the trail for sustainable buildings.

The production will feature the different phases of project development and critical stages of construction on these integrated energy efficient homes. The owners, designers, craftsmen and crew will share their challenges and triumphs as construction moves along.

For those of you that have been following our blogs, you’ll recognize Dan

Whitmore’s house as one of the homes featured in the production.

I can’t determine what the distribution of this program will look like or when, but here is a link to the site which also has contact information: The House that Saved the World.

With green real estate and appraisals just gaining a foothold and market direction, this website is a nice clearinghouse for what is currently on the market worldwide. Listed Green® Homes – the Green MLS (Multiple Listing Service) exclusively for Energy Efficient, Sustainable Homes and Real Estate Developments For Sale Worldwide.

Listed Green Homes claims to be “committed to being part of the solution by educating the green home buyer and promoting sustainable, energy efficient, healthy building design – helping elevate the market value of green homes and eco-friendly developments.”

Plus, it’s just fun to window shop…

Passive House Arrives in North America:  Could It Revolutionize the Way We Build?

Full Story from Environmental Building News

Executive Summary

Originating in Germany twenty years ago and drawing inspiration from the superinsulation and passive solar movements in North America in the late 1970s, Passive House has migrated across the Atlantic. To date, about a dozen buildings have been certified to the Passive House standard in North America, and at least two dozen are in various stages of development. The Passive House Institute U.S. (PHIUS) and its founder and director, German-trained architect Katrin Klingenberg, are leading the implementation of the system in the U.S.

Passive House is a quantitative, performance-based standard for ultra-low-energy buildings—both residential and commercial. The U.S.-based standard, which is virtually identical to the German Passivhaus standard, allows no more than 15 kWh/m2/yr (4,755 Btu/ft2/yr) of energy consumption for heating, the same for cooling, and total energy consumption, including lighting, appliances, and plug loads, of no more than 120 kWh/m2/yr (38,000 Btu/ft2/yr) of primary energy use, which accounts for the energy used in extracting and processing fossil fuels and generating and distribution of electricity. In addition, Passive House standards include a stringent air tightness requirement of 0.6 air changes per hour at 50 pascals pressure difference across the envelope.

While energy experts EBN spoke with like the specific targets, some argue that the Passive House standard could be improved in North America by addressing some concerns, including how the standard works in our more diverse climate, the inherent penalty against small buildings, and the difficulty of achieving Passive House performance with existing buildings.

Passive House could move to the head of the line in Thurston County WA.

Thanks to a Federal Grant, Certified Passive House Consultant Tessa Smith, and a host of others, along with Thurston County, There is a draft document circulating Thurston County that clears the way for Passive House and other green building method permit applications. The document recognizes Passive House by name. If adopted, the documents states:

“This policy sets forth the process and procedures in reviewing a recognized green certified building permit application.

Purpose: To provide a collaborative and expedited review of green certified building permits with a goal to promote development that seeks the greatest possible reduction in environmental impacts.

1.            Any reference to “green certified building permit application” means only such applications that have been certified through Built Green, LEED, NAHB, Passive House, and Energy Star programs

Ultra- Energy Efficient Home-Passive House

We get loads of questions about Passive House, but the two bottom line biggies are:

• How affordable is the upgrade to design to the Passive House standard?

• What is the typical payback period?

The question of money, and fortunately the strongest selling point of the Passive House  approach!

As for affordability, the two main aspects that must be considered are the upfront construction costs and the operating costs. The upfront costs can be fairly modest ranging from 5% to 10% on average. In a Passive House there are no expensive heating and cooling systems so these savings can go directly into the effort of optimizing the building envelope, a key design component in a Passive House. Also, keep in mind that the proprietary Passive House Planning Package (PHPP) modeling software allows us to finely tune a project to optimize the materials selections as well as other design adjustments all leading to meeting the energy and cost goals. There is a wonderful graph that I like to show people to help them get the hang of how Passive House compares in the world of ‘green’ building. In the case of a non-Passive House ‘green’ project the graph shows a steeply increasing cost as more and more ‘green’ selections are made for that project. (For example, adding a geothermal heat pump, or expensive renewable energy system). So the line goes up and up, then we pop the Passive House model in there and the line plunges straight down, back to a modest 5-10%. This is because a Passive House is simple and doesn’t require expensive systems.

Operating costs of a well designed Passive House can be 25% of a typical code-built home (10-15% of the heating and cooling demand and 25-35% of the rest of the operating costs: lights, appliances, and DH, etc.) So, imagine, if the typical home offers a $250 per month average total for electric and gas bills, the similarly sized Passive House next door would have monthly bills of approximately $63. It’s hard to argue about the affordability here, and that doesn’t speak to rising energy costs down the road!

To give you an idea of payback, I plugged in some data in a spreadsheet made by the spreadsheet wizard himself, Randy Foster, President of The Artisans Group. I made conservative assumptions by not figuring in the fact that energy costs will likely rise in the future, and I assumed that total operating energy savings would be 75%.  Here we go:

• Cost of typical code built house: $350,000
• Cost of similar-sized Passive House: $374,500
• % Difference: 7%
• Average monthly energy bill for code built home: $250
• Annual Rate of increase in energy costs: 0%
• Energy cost reduction of Passive House: 75%

So,  the 7% extra cost to build Passive is paid back at year 5. After year 5, energy savings become money in your pocket, in this conservative example, that’s about $187 per month! You can see how that will really add up over time…

We currently have 8 Passive House projects in some stage of development, of these only 2 came in seeking Passive House. Once the other 6 began to understand the concepts of Passive House, there was no looking back. It’s such a delight when a good product will sell itself, and such a delight when socially and environmentally conscious choices make good fiscal sense!

The entire article can be read here. Below is an excerpt to whet your appetite:

August 21st, 2009

“I recently have undertaken a building project with Brooklyn Cohousing following Passive House standards. My clients decided to pursue this course after carefully examining the affordability and predictability of energy usage with the Passive House option.

Predictability: USGBC’s own commissioned report, Energy Performance of LEED for New Construction Buildings (pdf), March 4, 2008 concluded “…measured performance displays a large degree of scatter…”  While this is true of other standards, it is not true of Passive House. Passive House has an unparalleled track record of predicting performance reliably. CEPHEUS, an E.U. sponsored program, verified Passive House’s reliability by developing hundreds of units of housing in multiple countries with different architects and contractors. I’d argue that the reliability of the methodology makes Passive House the least risky approach to super-efficient building.  That reliability makes Passive House convincing – and was one of the factors, I believe, that convinced Brooklyn Cohousing to go for it.”

Mr. Levenson goes on to write about ‘affordability’ and payback period, typical characteristics of a Passive House, and a few paragraphs on the Passive House Planning Package (PHPP) modeling software. “The PHPP is the most sophisticated static energy model in use today”.

Ken Levenson is a partner in Levenson McDavid Architects P.C., in Brooklyn, NY. Ken also maintains the blog Checklist Toward Zero Carbon.

Dear Editor-

It was strikingly dramatic for me to read John Dodge’s recent article about the Passive House movement, and even more poignant to consider that The Olympian’s readership is becoming more keenly aware of this amazing approach to energy efficient homes.  I am Tessa Smith, Certified Passive House Consultant (CPHC) at The Artisans Group.  I have the pleasure of producing home designs that we build which meet the stringent energy performance standard of Passive House.

As the article describes, Passive House is a specific approach to design and construction that yields a house 90% more efficient than a typical code built home.  Unfortunately there is a lot of confusion around whether this is just a recycled version of the passive solar movement from the seventies, or something entirely different.  Good ideas do benefit from the work of previous pioneers, and the Passive House approach does include super insulation and solar gain management.  However, Passive House is a unique and much more specific approach – it relies on the best of many advances in green building, and the approach removes the need for a large heating system, solar or otherwise.  Passive House conservation measures are so optimized that homes can be heated with as little energy as it takes to run a hair dryer.  This makes the Passive House approach applicable to any project, regardless of solar access.  The approach is the best way to meet a growing demand for affordable and energy efficient homes.

A true Passive House goes through a rigorous design process, with attention being paid to the building science of the structure related to both performance and longevity.  A Certified Passive House Consultant designs the project to be a Passive House from the start.  This maximizes efficiency and reduces the cost to construct.  The design is evaluated through a holistic and data intense modeling process, using the Passive House Planning Package (PHPP), including third party verification and regulation from PHIUS (Passive House Institute of the United States).  Performance markers and verification during construction ensure the quality and final performance of your Passive House.

When I first became a CPHC, local interest was sporadic, and more often than not the first time my clients heard about Passive House was from me.  Now, interest in Passive House is being propelled by financial realities: a modest increase in the cost of construction, and a quick return on this investment.  The savings on energy bills pay off the upfront costs in a short period of time.  National interest is overwhelming, and The Artisans Group is being contacted on a regular basis by people interested in Passive House design-build projects.

In response to this rapidly growing market, I have witnessed some firms make claims of offering “passive-like” houses, as if a partial approach could possibly compare to the “real deal”!  One of the many beauties of Passive House is either you meet the criteria or you don’t, and there are no exceptions.  Beware of green washing, if a home isn’t a Certified Passive House, then it isn’t a Passive House at all.  Unless the Passive House standard is fully achieved, a quick return on investment will not be realized; partially meeting the standard will result in a less comfortable, and less efficient house, and one that is more expensive to build and own.

If you want to know more about Passive House, feel free to contact me at the Artisans Group.  You can swing by to take a peek at several Passive House projects that are currently in the design phase.  The Artisans Group will begin construction of the North Residence in July, the first in our county and the second in the state of Washington.  We will be photo-documenting the process, and updating our blogs on a weekly basis!

Authored by Jefferson Kolle, in the March edition, Fine Homebuilding did a great job featuring two new Passive House projects, one  in Massachusetts and one in Minnesota. The Minnesota project employed the use of other renewable resources, such as a photovoltaic system, to get the Passive House in a net-zero mode. Both of these projects are aesthetically beautiful homes.

The article is really a superb summary of the Passive House standard. It begins with a brief description of Passive House and covers a bit of the history. The author went on to cover the salient parts of the building envelop and air handling system. He effectively covers the Passive House Planning Package (PHPP) modeling software used to remove the guesswork of performance results once the project is complete. Finally, he talks about getting accredited as a Certified Passive House Consultant.

This is an excellent piece, and concisely written. This article very effectively puts the Passive House concept into a nutshell. Complete with project photos and a labeled cutaway wall section.

The article (.pdf) can be downloaded from the Passive House US (PHIUS) website. The article is called: “The Passive House, Green without Gizmos”

This is reposted.

Passive homes for those committed to the environment

THE OLYMPIAN | • Published May 16, 2010

The next generation of energy-efficient homes is about to make its debut in South Sound.
Passive homes is an architectural design that eliminates the need for a central heating and cooling system in a building through super insulation, airtight construction that wipes out thermal bridges, and high-tech heat recovery and ventilation systems that maintain air quality.

The design was born in Germany about 15 years ago. Since, some 20,000 homes, schools and office buildings worldwide have been built to Passive House standards, reducing space heating costs by 75 percent to 90 percent in the process. But only a few of those projects are in the United States.

Maybe I’m wrong, but it seems we’re often slow to embrace ideas for sustainable, sensible living from other countries.

The Artisans Group architect (*Correction, Tessa is not a licensed architect) Tessa Smith is the only certified Passive House consultant in South Sound. Her enthusiasm for the future of passive homes is almost contagious.

In your Passive House, a hair dryer or a candle or a coil from the hot water heater could be your central heating source, she said.

The Passive House takes energy efficiency to a new level, she said. A case in point: While the premium to construct a $325,000 home built to code climbs about 7 percent using passive standards, the homeowner can recover those extra costs within five years through reduced energy costs. After that, there are savings to be had, year after year.

Passive Homes builds on the progress in energy efficiency marked by “Built Green” and LEED-certified construction, said Zeta Kelly, advertising director for The Artisans Group.

“I’ve been in the energy business for 25 years,” Kelly said. “This is the first time the housing market has been ready for this.”

Smith is working with five clients interested in Passive House projects, including DT and Kim North of Olympia, who have a design for a 2,400-square-foot home on Marion Street in Olympia.

“We did a bunch of research on Passive House. It’s not a fad; it may be the model for the future,” DT North said. If all goes well, the Norths’ project should be under construction in late June or early July.

North said the energy savings are appealing and the design is the right thing to do, if people are serious about reducing their reliance on greenhouse gas-emitting fossil fuels.

“We can buy hybrid cars and install energy-efficient heating systems, but if we really want to make a difference, this makes more sense,” he said.

We’ll keep an eye on the North housing project as it moves through the city building permit and construction stages; it should be interesting.