Built in 1850, this home in Dartmoor national park would have relied on local timber supplies for heating until the advent of widely-available central heating. One passive house-flavoured retrofit later, it’s back to its wood-burning roots – only this time with much less wood use, and much higher comfort.
In 2014, one couple decided to give up life in a van and convert an old newsagents in Shrewsbury into a very small low energy home, using the principles of the passive house standard as their guide. So how did it work out, and what is life really like in such a small home?
SEAI will host Ireland’s first ever deep retrofit conference at the Aviva Stadium in Dublin on 21 June.
When it came to upgrading an old stone-walled building to the Enerphit standard — with all the inherent challenges such an upgrade poses for energy, airtightness and moisture — who better to have as your client and defacto site manager than a professor of physics?
Leading low energy ventilation supplier Sustainable Homes Scotland has advised anyone carrying out a deep retrofit — or building a small low energy dwelling — to consider the benefits of a new generation of decentralised mechanical ventilation with heat recovery (MVHR) systems.
We all do, argues Dr Peter Rickaby, but the goal of mass retrofitting our energy inefficient building stock is hampered by the fact that when it comes to most retrofits, we simply don’t know what we’re trying to achieve.
The deep retrofit of this two-storey 1950s house in Cork City transformed a draughty, poorly-insulated dwelling into a comfortable, low-energy home for one family – coming close to the Enerphit standard in the process.
As part of the Passive House Association of Ireland southern region programme of CPD in passive house building knowledge, members have kindly agreed to open their passive building projects for site visits as a learning resource for builders, architects, students, systems installers and potential clients.
Leading low energy and passive house builder Pat Doran Construction recently picked up two leading construction industry awards for its Enerphit-standard upgrade to an early 20th century house in Rathgar, Co Dublin.
This pioneering deep energy upgrade of a 1960s home in Wicklow will take place in phases over at least five years, with the aim of making it more affordable to go passive by renovating on a step-by-step basis.
Passive house & sustainable building mortgage provider Ecology Building Society has become the first building society in the UK to be awarded the Fair Tax Mark.
The latest versions of PHPP and designPH are intended to make passive house design both easier and more accurate than ever before — and to plan for a future powered by renewable energy. Jan Steiger of the Passive House Institute explains the latest features of both software packages.
This pioneering upgrade project, completed in 2009, turned a Victorian redbrick in Birmingham into one of the UK’s greenest homes. Along with a much wider ecological agenda, the house employed fabric first principles
of insulation and airtightness, and met passive house design targets at a time when the standard was still in its infancy in the UK.
It’s taken Mick Kiernan more than 10 years to upgrade his Cork bungalow, and it’s still not finished. But along the way he discovered the passive house standard and let its principles guide his way towards a warm, airtight and healthy home.
The upgrade of two social housing blocks in Manchester to the Enerphit standard demonstrates how deep energy retrofit can play a part in turning old, run-down estates into vibrant, comfortable, low energy communities.
This ambitious and complicated project — a partial upgrade, partial rebuild of an old detached property in south Dublin — is on course to achieve the onerous Enerphit standard for retrofit.
Grosvenor’s upgrade of two historic properties in Belgravia brings high-end passive housing to Westminster.
Six years after it was completed, Passive House Plus takes a look at a pioneering low energy upgrade that went on to become the UK’s first certified Enerphit project, to find out how it has performed — and what lessons have been learned.
A passive retrofit in Co Meath offers a template that could be applied across much of the Irish housing stock: a long, dark, 1970s bungalow was transformed into a bright modern home that’s now warm and comfortable.
If you’ve ever wanted to take a passive house for a road test, one holiday letting on the coast of west Cork may be too good an opportunity to turn down. The aptly named Sea Spray – an as yet uncertified Enerphit upgraded bungalow – is a bona fide triumph in the face of adversity.
Hitting Enerphit – the passive house standard for retrofits – wasn’t challenging enough for one Yorkshire retrofit project. The team also had to stop the building falling down, and avoid wholesale changes to the building’s external appearance.
There was a time when insulating an historic property meant treading lightly on its building fabric. But today, guided by building physics, passive house designers continue to push the boundaries of retrofit by bringing old homes up to modern standards of super-insulation. This project is the third such deep retrofit to an historic London property by Green Tomato Energy.
Tina Holt had experience advising homeowners on energy efficiency, so when she wanted a low energy home, buying a run-down 1950s dwelling and aiming to turn it passive was an obvious step. She tells her own story below.
Hitting the Enerphit standard can be challenging for even the most seasoned passive house specialist, so what chances did Kate and Geoff Ball’s semi-d have when the architect and builder had no passive experience? With a well-planned approach and no end of enthusiasm, they passed with flying colours, as Kate Ball explains.
In spite of a dauntingly complex and crumbling existing building, a detached house in Donnybrook has been modernised to become Ireland’s 2nd certified Enerphit building.
Virtually any building, anywhere can achieve certified passive house status, as these four transatlantic buildings show – including a Viennese skyscraper, an upgrade to an NYC home predating the Empire State Building, a German museum housing valuable works of art and a net zero energy home in New Mexico.
Picking from some of the best current sustainable design the world has to offer, we profile a floating passive house currently moored in the Netherlands, a ground-breaking timber hybrid tower in Austria, a multi unit passive scheme in Malmö, and an Enerphit upgrade to a brutalist Connecticut home originally designed by one of Frank Lloyd Wright’s colleagues.
Ed Miliband has said that the UK will build 200,000 homes per year if Labour gets into government, while promising to make the UK a “world-leading green economy." If such assertions are mutually exclusive, then they must be treated as hollow rhetoric, indistinguishable from David Cameron’s husky hugging stunt and unfulfilled pledge to lead the “greenest government ever.”
A house in south Dublin recently became the first Irish building to become EnerPHit certified. Architect Joseph Little describes the challenges of meeting the Passive House Institute’s standard for upgrading existing building.