297. Passive House 101 - Anatomy of an amazing net-zero cold climate passive house

test this is a test welcome to project leo my name is heather and this is axel hello [Laughter] hi i'm david dodge welcome to green energy futures today we bring you the amazing story of an intergenerational family in calgary alberta building one of the most amazing green homes that we've seen on green energy futures heather and axel sorensen are part of a new breed of homebuilders their company homes by sorensen was started in 2015 in calgary alberta their focus almost entirely on building high performance homes i'm axel sorensen and i'm heather sorensen we're the owner operators of homes by sorenson well we are a husband and wife team and uh our backgrounds are completely different in nature which uh that wasn't that great how did we get started he made me know like we got started how we got started was that you've been in construction since the day you got out of university or the week and then you were doing home renovations for many years decided it was time to start home building and somewhere in there convinced me to quit my corporate job and join we were also very passionate about uh um building energy efficient homes homes that were kind of homes of the future kind of getting ahead of the curve so to speak we definitely gravitated to building net zero homes net zero homes are homes that produce as much energy as they use on a yearly basis and that was exactly what we were looking to build and despite being ahead of the market curve the sorensens have carved out an enviable niche building net zero homes today they're wrapping up work on one of the coolest projects ever right now we are in the leo passive house project leo yes and this is a custom project we were approached by our clients to build this house for them and they wanted to [Music] achieve the passive health standard with their house so in the energy efficiency world passive homes are the upper echelon they are the uh the top tier of high energy high performance homes this is a very special home the clients heather and her son glenn and wife emily sought out the sorensens who specialize in net zero homes to build a multi-generational dual suite home that's as green as it could be very into it they're very very um earth focused they wanted to explore the impact their carbon footprint on the production of this home they wanted to know um they're they're just they wanted to know every detail and how they could be a part of the solution towards global warming they wanted their dream home to be built to the passive house standard and for it to be net zero energy together the sorensens and the client work to build the most affordable passive house that money can buy a passive house is anywhere from 80 to 90 percent more energy efficient and this house here as well is a net zero house which means that it's producing as much energy as it uses on an annual basis and we're doing that with uh our 15 kilowatt solar array here uh by skyfire energy to be more than five times more efficient than a cold-built home this home is completely wrapped with high levels of insulation right here you can see exactly how thick these walls are here so what we have here is a 12 inch double studded wall with dense pack cellulose past that we have another 2x4 wall with a bad insulation for a total of r50 almost no heat is lost through super insulated walls insulation forms an unbroken jacket from basement floor to the roof in our basement slab we have an r30 floor assembly down there and in our basement foundation we have an r50 and we move to our above grade wall assembly we have another r50 there and then up in our attic space here where we have an r80 loose fill cellulose no hot air gets in in the hot summers and no cold air gets in in the long cold winters of calgary alberta where temperatures can reach minus 40 celsius okay come with me i have to show you these windows these are local in a tech passive house certified triple pane ultra efficient windows they are tilt and turn okay so check that out there we go and then i'm going to show you this here's how they open you're going to see here how thick our wall assembly is these are incredible this wall assembly is so beefed up and so incredible you get these major windows showing you no heats going out no colds coming in there is just so this building envelope is remarkable one of the key elements of these super insulated homes is air tightness the day we were there cooper lee was doing a blower door test to check just how airtight this home is it is a good number it's quite good actually the code prescribed value of a new home now is 2.5 you want that number to be lower so this is about 20 percent of what a new home would be incredibly this large passivhaus is so efficient it has no furnace and since the home is so tight it has a heat recovery ventilator that provides plenty of fresh air so here's exactly how this works here so this here is our hrv our heat recovery ventilator this thing is up to 85 percent efficient that means that it is recovering 85 of the heat that it is trying to expel out which is extremely energy efficient the hrv actually has a little electric heater at the intake to preheat air on the coldest days of the year this system is also connected to the heat pump water heater to get more heat when it's needed on the coldest of days in the winter that needs a little extra boost here we will send that 450 percent efficient hot water through this hydronic coil and the hotter the supply air will blow over top of it and supply in our house with hot air this passive house requires 80 to 90 percent less energy to heat it thanks to insulation and the efficiency of the mechanical systems and another important piece to our high production homes whether it's net zero energy or passive energy is the appliances we select they must be energy efficient my personal favorite is the induction cooktop this baby heats up only what is touching it the pot or the pan that is touching it is the only space that is heated making it two times more efficient than your standard cooktop and yeah it just heats quick it cools quick and it's also very safe so that you don't you don't burn yourself all of the appliances in this home are very efficient but the induction stove is also one of our favorites what we've found is that our net zero homes are costing anywhere from 50 to 60 thousand dollars extra uh and with the amount of solar that we are producing off these homes your energy bills are decreased enough that the payback period for these homes is anywhere from 10 to 13 years and that is extremely good this means the savings more than cover the additional mortgage required to build efficiently and it's not long before the home is paying your utility bills the sorensons work very closely with the client incorporating a little do-it-yourself into the home to give it a homey feel and to save money this passive house is actually two homes in one we actually do have two clients with this property it's very unique in that it's passive home but it's also also a multi-generational home where it is a single family suited home so we have a front unit and a back unit the front unit is a raised bungalow specifically designed for an age-in-place setup for heather our client heather is a retired lawyer or moving into retirement and she lives in the front unit glenn and emily glenn is her son emily her daughter-in-law live in the back unit both suites have a stunning combined kitchen living room and the two suites share a common mechanical room this right here is the shared mechanical shared storage shared laundry and our connecting room to connect the two homes together if you don't want to go outside you want to go through building a passive home building a green home was not even they weren't even a little bit interested it was a non-negotiable for them they wanted a builder that was going to build a home of the future that was going to be like-minded in their goals towards uh global warming towards managing the carbon footprint during production of this home they were so involved turning over this home to them in a few weeks is going to probably be one of our most emotional possessions this project enlisted a passive house home designer and it was so innovative that it also attracted funding from the smart sustainable resilient infrastructure association well aside from our homeowners that we worked with here we also worked with our passive host planner who did all the modeling for this passive home that was kevin brown at nickel design as well this house was granted funding from the ssria that's the smart sustainable resilient infrastructure association the project leo passivhaus is an infield project in calgary alberta but despite the large size of this multi-generational home the front facade was designed to fit right into this older neighborhood as we were wrapping up our shoot at project leo neighbors paused at the front doors and asked who the builder was she and her husband wanted to do the same thing our thanks to heather and axel for spending an entire day with us so we could really give you the lowdown on the anatomy of this passive house the home of the future learn more at greenenergyfutures.org for green energy futures i'm david dodge notice the vintage handles the vintage credenza we worked very closely with them finding refurbished pieces and really pulling together a distinct vibe [Music]

Channel: Green Energy Futures

Views: 42,639

Keywords: Green Energy Futures

Id: KbJLSrx-jXI

Length: 11min 19sec (679 seconds)

Published: Wed Sep 29 2021