More Passivhaus news from Ecobuild
The Passivhaus Trust's Fringe session saw a packed room(photo: Kirsten Priebe)
There was a huge amount of interest in Passivhaus at Ecobuild this year.
Nick Grant comments, ‘There was certainly an enormous amount of interest in Passivhaus and everyone I spoke to seemed to know something about it and a good number are involved in actual projects at various stages from planning to monitoring. However there are still a lot of misconceptions around, such as the idea that no heating is needed. I do think that there is a groundswell of interest in genuine, proven low energy design rather than the pretence of Zero Carbon buildings which feels like an expensive and ineffectual distraction.’
Jonathan Hines of Architype comments on AJ Footprint, ‘There was a powerfully strong feeling of positive support for Passivhaus and its relevance in the UK. Wolfgang noted that whilst the UK was one of the last northern European countries to take up Passivhaus, we have embraced it with the greatest enthusiasm and energy. Whilst there were worries expressed about the watering down of standards, Wolfgang dismissed these and encouraged everyone to focus on education and training. Strong in his belief and evidenced by his work, Wolfgang is convinced the best way for Passivhaus to develop is from the bottom up, through real life experience and examples, rather than by the top down’. Read the full article here.
Bill Butcher of Green Building Store thought the Fringe session 'Driving Passivhaus delivery in the UK', was an ‘excellent debate’ in a summary of the event on Building online. He noted that the panel explored some of the push factors for Passivhaus in the UK such as robustness, cost-effectiveness, usefulness of PHPP as a design tool, sheer common sense; and the factors which have been slowing it down such as fear of MVHR systems, unskilled construction industry, confusing ‘zero carbon’ Government agenda etc. He also noted that there were calls for the standard and term Passivhaus not to be debased and for the need to prevent ‘Passivhaus hype’ and people bandying the phrase about without being able to back it up.
Bill Butcher further comments on the 'Passivhaus Principles in Refurbishment' event, ‘Rob Prewett and Justin Bere both spoke about their Passivhaus refurb projects – which offered useful general ideas on refurbishment – including consideration of design of hot water systems in Passivhaus projects and an intriguing method which involves the use of inflatable bags to make sure windows are placed correctly….The need for awareness of interstitial condensation in refurbs, especially when using internal insulation, was also discussed…..The jury is still out on the financial viability of Passivhaus refurbs as analysis of all the costing of TSB retrofit for the future projects has not yet been undertaken but it sounds like costs have varied considerably, obviously depending on the original condition of the house before the refurb.’ Read the full article here.
Chris Herring concludes, ‘Ecobuild has now become the major construction exhibition in the UK, so it is a strange mix of pretty standard construction products with an effort to show some environmental credentials, huge amounts of solar, and some good and innovative products and companies. Dr Feist said that in Germany there was a point where there was a sudden surge of interest in Passivhaus, which after a couple of years dropped back to more sensible and sustainable development. In many ways this is what I think we are seeing now in the UK, with lots of interest in Passivhaus, without necessarily much understanding. I do think that there is an increasing awareness that the current approaches to low energy/low carbon construction in the UK are often neither well grounded, robust or proven. This has led to increasing interest in the Passivhaus standard and methodology. There was clearly a huge amount of interest in the Trust, with the aisles around the stand jammed with people trying to access the stand. The important thing for the Trust is to continue to ensure that the interest translates into solid understanding, and that the Standard is upheld and maintained without compromise.’
Follow more news on the Passivhaus Trust at Ecobuild using the links:
http://blog.emap.com/footprint/2011/03/08/ecd-at-ecobuild/
http://blog.emap.com/footprint/2011/03/02/ac-architects-cambridge-at-ecobuild/
http://www.nesltd.co.uk/blog/ecobuild-eco-bling
14th March 2011
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