Bioclimatic (Passive/Net Zero) Residence
SOUTHERN ALBERTA, CANADA
072814 | 1402
PROJECT DESCRIPTION
Project Type:
Single Family Residence (Passivehaus/Net-Zero)Client:
WitheldBudget (CAD$):
$525,000Size / Program:
+/- 2,977 sq. ft. / 276 sq. m.Building Design / Engineering:
One One Ten with Crosier Kilgour & Partners, SigmaRho2, Sunwise Engineering & SMP EngineeringServices:
Architecture + Performance Based Design Analysis (Sefaira Architecture)General Contractor:
Reside ConstructionProject Date / Status:
Unrealized
Steadily since the 1960's, single family residences have expanded over 3 times in area while the average family household has decreased. Settlement patterns of the last half century have consumed vast land resources by means of carpet suburbanization at low densities. This form of ex-urban development borrows from the future through taxation and municipal subsidies that provide and maintains services, utilities and transportation infrastructure systems required to access sprawling developments designed for the automobile.
Much of today's formulaic housing is largely concieved as a commodity of uninspiring garage fronted homes identical to the next on narrow lots often designed with awkward spaces more often tolerated than serving a tangible use. While this kind of development is an important economic driver, vast resources are utilized for developing a typology that perpetuates a status quo trend of suburbanization. Furthermore, depsite the availability and interest in better systems, North America continues to rely heavily on fuel dependent mechanical and electrical systems to provide comfortable indoor environments across all climates alike without being significantly progressive or adaptive. This unsustainable model of city making ignores basic approaches to environmental design and consumes vast amounts of energy supplied by increasingly expensive and finite fossil fuels.
Despite increasing pressure and improvements in government and society to make construction codes ‘greener’, the building code has largely remained a safety based code. The most recent Alberta Building Code has now adopted the National Energy Code for Buildings (2011) and will require more of the built environment after November, 2016. Although much attention is afforded to sustainable building design in the public or institutional realm, the residential market has primarily made elective improvements for sustainble design across the housing construction market, with only a few exceptions. Unlike Europe, single family homes in America remain a largely neglected area of practice for sustainable/environmental design despite recent certification standards in place such as ‘LEED for Homes‘ or a growing interest in the ‘PassiveHaus‘ standard that more rigorously acknowledge the importance of passive design, building envelopes & fenestration and other systems toward a greater potential for resource conservation, design thinking and overall wellness and quality of life.
One One Ten's client brief initially aimed to "build an off grid, eco-friendly, affordable, modest home with the ideals of sustainability in correlation with [the client's] lifestyle". In the course of that journey, One One Ten's design solution evolved as an environmentally and ecologically sensitive net-zero residence for a family of three that challenged conventions by developing a climate specific architectural response. This was accomplished using proven means: a super-insulated, air tight envelope with few thermal bridges; a ground source heat pump combined with a liquid to air ducted HVAC delivery system; a passive-solar design and net-metered micro-generative solar photovoltaic (on-ground and building mounted) hybrid system that would perform at or near net-zero energy consumption annually.
The goals of the project were attained within a client determined footprint and by taking strict advantage of the sustainable design opportunities available on an unserviced rural property on the prairie. Constraints were converted into long-term advantages by scrutinizing the family's primary consumption and energy needs in order to capitalize on design strategies that address the physics of climate and layer as many functions together under a flexible program of interior and exterior spaces. The project further evaluates necessity in a way that continues to respond to 21st century living in a world lifestyle proving to be less and less sustainable.
Although the project was unrealized mainly due to budget short-comings for the client and a lack of provincial subsidies at the time for any sustainability improvements, the project would have become a rare example of high calibre self-sufficient sustainable architecture in southern Alberta.
Much of today's formulaic housing is largely concieved as a commodity of uninspiring garage fronted homes identical to the next on narrow lots often designed with awkward spaces more often tolerated than serving a tangible use. While this kind of development is an important economic driver, vast resources are utilized for developing a typology that perpetuates a status quo trend of suburbanization. Furthermore, depsite the availability and interest in better systems, North America continues to rely heavily on fuel dependent mechanical and electrical systems to provide comfortable indoor environments across all climates alike without being significantly progressive or adaptive. This unsustainable model of city making ignores basic approaches to environmental design and consumes vast amounts of energy supplied by increasingly expensive and finite fossil fuels.
Despite increasing pressure and improvements in government and society to make construction codes ‘greener’, the building code has largely remained a safety based code. The most recent Alberta Building Code has now adopted the National Energy Code for Buildings (2011) and will require more of the built environment after November, 2016. Although much attention is afforded to sustainable building design in the public or institutional realm, the residential market has primarily made elective improvements for sustainble design across the housing construction market, with only a few exceptions. Unlike Europe, single family homes in America remain a largely neglected area of practice for sustainable/environmental design despite recent certification standards in place such as ‘LEED for Homes‘ or a growing interest in the ‘PassiveHaus‘ standard that more rigorously acknowledge the importance of passive design, building envelopes & fenestration and other systems toward a greater potential for resource conservation, design thinking and overall wellness and quality of life.
One One Ten's client brief initially aimed to "build an off grid, eco-friendly, affordable, modest home with the ideals of sustainability in correlation with [the client's] lifestyle". In the course of that journey, One One Ten's design solution evolved as an environmentally and ecologically sensitive net-zero residence for a family of three that challenged conventions by developing a climate specific architectural response. This was accomplished using proven means: a super-insulated, air tight envelope with few thermal bridges; a ground source heat pump combined with a liquid to air ducted HVAC delivery system; a passive-solar design and net-metered micro-generative solar photovoltaic (on-ground and building mounted) hybrid system that would perform at or near net-zero energy consumption annually.
The goals of the project were attained within a client determined footprint and by taking strict advantage of the sustainable design opportunities available on an unserviced rural property on the prairie. Constraints were converted into long-term advantages by scrutinizing the family's primary consumption and energy needs in order to capitalize on design strategies that address the physics of climate and layer as many functions together under a flexible program of interior and exterior spaces. The project further evaluates necessity in a way that continues to respond to 21st century living in a world lifestyle proving to be less and less sustainable.
Although the project was unrealized mainly due to budget short-comings for the client and a lack of provincial subsidies at the time for any sustainability improvements, the project would have become a rare example of high calibre self-sufficient sustainable architecture in southern Alberta.
PROJECT SUPPORT
