modern high-performance architecture
I just posted some photos of the Passive House in the Woods. Please use this link to view the gallery.
Please join the design team and Midwest Home for a public open house at the Passive House in the Woods tomorrow from 1 – 4 pm. We look forward to showing the home and explaining how it can stay warm without a furnace or boiler, and how it makes more energy than it consumes.
Rear stairwell
Today we had the final blower door test at the Passive House in the Woods project done. The result is a wonderful 0.26 ACH50, or 70 CFM of leakage at 50 Pascal pressure. Find more details in my article on the Passive House in the Woods website.
Events are subject to change. Please check back.
Click here to view the Channel 5 TV coverage of the Passive House in the Woods.
Just to be accurate, the waste-water heat recovery unit in the basement does not heat or cool the home, it pre-warms cold water going into the hot water system to reduce the need for water heating.
MPR picked up on the Passive House in the Woods and conducted an interview with Gary Konkol, the owner.
You can also find the interview on MPR’s website.
Due to popular demand we added another opportunity to see this amazing project on Thursday, July 1st at 2 pm.
Please RSVP to Amanda at Morr Construction: amanda@morrconstruction.com
Metro Hippie aka Josh Foss put up a blog post about his recent visit to the Passive House in the Woods project. You can find it at this link.
The Pioneer Press published an article about the Passive House in the Woods: “Hudson, Wis. / House’s energy use puts it nearly off the grid”
Thanks for signing up for the construction tour today. We look forward to having you and to show you around this amazing home. We’ll see you at the site at Noon.
Directions and Parking Instructions
The property is located at 908 Kirkwood Way North, Town of Hudson, WI 54016 (directions, see below). We encourage people to car-pool, seek parking on 10th Avenue, and walk 1/2 block to the property from there.
Due to popular demand, we added an additional tour of the Passive House in the Woods (PhitW) project this Thursday, 5/27 at Noon. For RSVPs please contact Amanda at Morr Construction.
This week we embarked on a little mini-series, highlighting 5 reasons why the Passive House in the Woods project is a sustainable project.
The leapfrog design of the Passive House in the Woods is based on integrated design and the holistic idea of building and living. Gary approached us with a vision of carbon-neutral, low impact building. That in itself does not sound like much. But we quickly realized how serious he is about it, and embraced the idea by assembling and leading a team of experts to deliver on all fronts of sustainability.
Follow the entire series at www.passivehouseinthewoods.com
Passive House in the Woods front entry perspective
The Passive House in the Woods will be open for a Construction Tour on 5/21/2010. We’ll have two tours that day. The first one is scheduled for 1.30 pm, the second one for 3.30 pm. If you are interested to see this high-performance building in person, please RSVP by 5/18 to Amanda at Morr Construction: amanda@morrconstruction.com
Richard Defendorf at greenbuildingadvisor.com just posted a nice article about the Passive House in the Woods:
Passive House in the (Wisconsin) Woods
A Passive House project nearing completion on the state’s western border aims for energy-positive performance and a high profile
The Passive House in the Woods project was just written up by the local Hudson Star Observer: “North Hudson man takes building ‘green’ to a new level”.
Martin Holladay at GreenBuildingAdvisor.com kicked off another fabulous subject on their blog entitled: Energy Efficiency Retrofits: Insulation or Solar Power?
As a certified Passive House Consultant, I am partial to the insulation. However, Martin makes a good point when comparing the two approaches. As the discussion goes, many points about this subject are being addressed. This is my reply:
Other selling points
by Tim Eian, TE Studio
Our firm has been working to get a viable DER business off the ground for the last two years. We practice in an extremely cold climate (MN). After the first year, we found that there were not enough selling points to overcome the first-day cost—and even calculations favoring a DER approach in the long run may not entice owners enough to go into debt—let alone their banks who cannot begin to understand what DER actually is and why it would create value and equity.
Year two has been more successful for us, as we have been focusing on more immediately tangible advantages of indoor environmental quality and health, as well as comfort (a big thing in a cold climate) and survivability. In addition, we are trying to single out the DER measures as Read more →
Green Builder Magazine featured the Passive House in the Woods project in its March issue in the Green Scene section. Thanks for the tip Josh.
We greatly appreciate all the wonderful conversations you brought to us at the Living Green Expo. We talked about Passive House for residential and commercial applications, proper site placement of buildings, sustainable building design in general, ventilation systems and indoor air-quality, lifecycle cost, quality construction, insulation, and so much more. We appreciate all your positive feedback about what we do and look forward to another year of extremely energy efficient building design until next year’s Expo.
We are in booth U21E on the upper floor of the Living Green Expo this weekend. We’ve had lots of enjoyable conversations about Passive House and energy-efficient building design. Come join us—it’s free!
Grandstand, MN State Fairgrounds
Tomorrow Sunday, we’ll be there from 10 until 5pm.
Jetson Green posted this wonderful article about the Passive House in the Woods today.
Join us and over 2oo exhibitors at this year’s free Living Green Expo on Saturday, May 1, from 10 am to 6 pm, and Sunday, May 2, from 10 am to 5 pm.
We are in booth U21 on the second floor across from the Main Workshop Stage (and next to French Meadow Bakery). Find us to talk about Passive House and Deep Energy Reduction Retrofitting, as well as the Passive House in the Woods project.
We’ll also be giving a Passive House workshop at 3 pm on Saturday, May 1. See you at the Minnesota State Fair Grounds Grandstand.
We can help ready your home for a sustainable future.
We provide expert design for extremely…
…and intelligent homes.
Talk to us about Passive House—the leading certified energy standard in the world—or deep energy reduction retrofitting—a dramatic reduction of energy for existing buildings.
TE Studio, 612-246-4670
Martin Holladay at Greenbuildingadvisor.com posted an interesting article about “magic boxes”—integrated heating, cooling, ventilation (and sometimes hot water) devices for Passivhaus construction. A great read: Magic-box your Passive House
The Homestar Energy Efficiency Retrofit Program could be the government’s cash for clunkers for homes equivalent. Read more about the offering that is in the works at this link.
In this writer’s humble opinion, the incentives offered may be low compared to the real cost of any significant and holistic energy efficiency upgrade in a home—especially in a cold climate. However, it’s a starting point.
We’ll be at this year’s Living Green Expo on May 1 & 2 as an exhibitor. Find us to talk about Passive House and Deep Energy Reduction Retrofitting. More details to follow.
Minnesota State Fair Grounds Grandstand
www.livinggreenexpo.mn
Treehugger just posted a short article about Passive House in the U.S. See it here. Meanwhile, BuildingGreen.com offers an article on whether or not Passive House can revolutionize the way we build here.
Josh Crenshaw of Morr Construction wrote a very nice little blog post on his impressions of the project as a site supervisor. You can find it at https://www.passivehouseinthewoods.com/
Over the course of the last month, we posted a number of updates that illustrate progress on site, as well as some of the design solutions for this high-performance home. Make sure to visit often, or follow Passive House in the Woods on Twitter at http://twitter.com/phitw
The building shell is almost complete at this point. It’s still wearing a skirt of tarps to protect the excavation around it. We look forward to exterior insulation and windows within the next two months. These items will help complete the shape of the building. We are looking to offer tours of the construction site—potentially in May or June. We’ll make an announcement once we have a firm date. Stay tuned.
The Passive House in the Woods project is currently featured in the spring edition of Minneapolis/St. Paul Magazine in the “Buzz” section: “Zero Footprint”.
We’ve been invited to spend a day with community leaders in Montevideo, MN to introduce Passive House, and discuss its potential for affordable housing and other projects in this Minnesota community. Thanks to Pat Moore of CURE and Kevin Hein for the invitation.
My colleagues at Morr Construction put together an array of videos documenting the construction of the Passive House in the Woods. You can find them at this link.
I reposted the most current one for your viewing pleasure. Enjoy!
I am lecturing twice today at the 20th annual Duluth Energy Design Conference and Expo.
Wednesday, 2/24/2010
Passive House: 10.30 am to 12 pm – French River room
DERR: 1.00 pm to 2.30 pm – Ballroom LM
Think of individual components or decisions as a serious of balls that you are juggling. The success of the project will be measured by the lowest flying ball you throw. If you throw one or more substantially higher than all the others, you may overspend in these categories. TE Studio’s job is to help you throw all balls to the same height to make sure we meet a common baseline of performance, and do it in a cost effective way.
The Passive House in the Woods is steadily growing, and it’s wearing a skirt these days 😉 The photo shows the Southwest corner. The ICF walls are complete up to the top of the second floor. The roof is scheduled for next week. In the meanwhile, the garage is also coming out of the ground—just to the North of the house.
We are tracking the progress more closely on the house’s own website. This page also holds information on the team members that assisted with the design and construction. So head on over if you like and follow this unique project. It’s also on Twitter at: http://twitter.com/phitw
I’ll be lecturing on Passive House at the U of M again this year. Jim Lutz was kind enough to invite me back to the architecture and ecology class. The lecture will be held on Tuesday, April 6 – 11.15 to 12.30, in Rapson 100 at the School of Architecture.
University of Minnesota – Rapson Hall
89 Church Street SE
Minneapolis, MN 55455
Directions
I’ll be talking about Passive House and Deep Energy Reduction Retrofit at the Duluth Energy Design Conference on Wednesday, 2/24/2010
The Passive House talk starts at 10.30, the Deep Energy Reduction Retrofit talk at 1.00 pm.
Duluth Energy Design Conference & Expo
Duluth Entertainment & Convention Center
Click on this link to contact the organizers about attending the event.
I’ll be speaking about and taking questions regarding Passive House and Deep Energy Reduction Retrofit at this month’s Building Enclosure Council meeting.
The meeting will be held on Tuesday, 2/9/2010 from 4-6 pm.
For more info on the BEC, please visit their page: Building Enclosure Council – Minnesota Meeting
This is the venue:
AIA Minnesota
Board Room
International Market Square, Suite 54
275 Market Street
Minneapolis, MNMN 55405
Phone 612.338.6763
Passive House Minnesota now has a website. Albeit with minimal content, but it’s there. We hope to expand on it in the near future with content from our first meeting this month. Going forward, this will be the place for information regarding Passive House in our region.
Passive House Minnesota, a strong lobby for a strong concept
The Passive House in the Woods blog is now online. We’ll still tweak it a bit and naturally add content as we move forward. In the future, however, there is now one place where you can check on updates regarding the project.
Sprout was kind enough to list us on their website. Their offer: “Connect to cool local places where you can buy and play in a sustainable way—and save while you’re at it.” Check them out at sprout.mn