They won’t win points for style, but these semi-detached, two-storey Irish homes fit seamlessly amongst their neighbours. This is a very familiar UK building style, now made better: both Passive House and affordable. The builder and architects’ depth of experience with Passive House was clearly key, according to an in-depth article by Passive House + magazine. The goal of affordability …
MBIE responds to climate change consultation
MBIE has provided its initial feedback based on consultation with industry on its “Building for climate change”. There are some promising signs from industry as the snapshot below indicates. We developed our own embodied carbon early design calculator based on the HPCD Handbook data. We also use LCAQuick from BRANZ for more detailed design-level studies. Based on this work, we …
Join US expert on marketing PH to homeowners
I’m looking forward to this seminar on how to effectively market Passive House and encourage those working on and designing Passive Houses to attend. This Zoom seminar is hosted by the Passive House Academy New Zealand on 29 June 2021 at 11am. It features John Oppermann, a US real estate agent (and executive director of the Earth Day Initiative), who …
More Passive House certifiers in NZ
Jason Quinn of Sustainable Engineering Ltd has been New Zealand’s sole Passive House certifier for five years but he’s no longer alone in the job. Toby Brooke and Sara Wareing were confirmed last Friday by PHI as accredited Passive House certifiers. Both work for Sustainable Engineering. Sara has a Masters degree in Building Science from Victoria University of Wellington, while …
Aus Passive House vs passive solar misses the point
If you haven’t heard about the Passive Solar versus Passive House bash up argument in Australia, you missed an entertaining example of people talking past each other. I am reminded of my long-running, friendly argument with a local passive solar enthusiast. In an excellent follow-up article, Dr Paola Leardini points out the starkly obvious: we need both climate sensitive design …
Leaky buildings aren’t over: thermal bridges create moisture issues
PREDOS director Rory Crosbie’s article in BRANZ’s Build magazine mostly argues for a national home warranty scheme based on the Canadian model. He does briefly touch on the inadequacy of the current New Zealand Building Code (of course, I agree): “Weathertightness aside, the New Zealand Building Code performance requirements of a building’s external fabric is still way below international standards. …
“Must do better”: Education Ministry sets new standards for school buildings
The Ministry of Education manages a huge property portfolio (>15,000 buildings, 2100 sites, >$31 billion replacement value). There are a lot of problem buildings, including some that are only a few years old. It has released a new design guide for school buildings, requiring a higher standard in some key respects than the current Building Code. Why doesn’t the whole …
We can build Passive House quality for the same price as Code-minimum: here’s proof
Joe Lyth is an Auckland based architect and newly-minted Passive House designer. He’s also an UK import who looks on the crappy homes New Zealanders put up with through an immigrant’s fresh eyes. Joe’s family are about to move into their new Passive House home that was built for less than a comparable new Auckland house. He’s written about this …
NZ’s first Passive House subdivision
Bushland Park is a new subdivision south-west of the Christchurch city centre, at the foot of the Port Hills and all its 12 homes are targeting Passive House performance. Given the experienced designer (Karen Manson of Meta Architects) and builder (Peter Bielski from Ethos Homes) we expect excellent results. Sustainable Engineering has been brought in early in the process—exactly when …