What is Passive House construction?

What is Passive House construction?

Passive house (German: Passivhaus) is a voluntary standard for energy efficiency in a building, which reduces the building’s ecological footprint. It results in ultra-low energy buildings that require little energy for space heating or cooling.

What are passive homes made of?

What Is a Passive House? Homes built to the Passive House standard use a building envelope’s first approach consisting of insulation, air sealing, and no thermal bridging. Windows, doors, and any other penetrations in the building envelope are all extremely high-performing.

Which features make a Passivhaus a sustainable building?

Common features include:

  • insulation well beyond the minimum standards for the climate zone.
  • ideal ventilation that recaptures conditioned air for use inside the home.
  • energy recovery at rates of 80 percent or more.
  • moisture recovery to maintain an ideal range of humidity.

What are the requirements of a passive house?

A Passive House is designed to typically meet 50% or more of the heat demand through passive solar gain (another 15–30% is provided by internal gains, leaving less than 20% of the total heating demand to be met by the heating system). This passive solar gain requires that south-facing windows have a high SHGC.

What are 5 principles of the passive house standard?

The Passive House standard is based on Five Principles:

  • Continuous Insulation & Thermal Bridge Free.
  • Airtight Barrier Layers.
  • High Performance Windows and Doors.
  • Controlled Ventilation.
  • Solar Gain and Loss through Design.

What are the key design and construction issues that the Passivhaus approach requires of a building?

The important issue to consider is which construction system is best suited to achieve the stringent requirements of Passivhaus – such as airtightness, elimination of thermal bridging and appropriate U-values – given the particular building type you are designing, its function and the form you are developing.

What is the R value for Passive House?

For Passive House, most buildings require envelope performance levels in the range of R-40 to R-60 for walls, R-50 to R-90 for roof systems, and typically about R-30 to R-50 for sub-slab assemblies.

What type of insulation is used in a Passive House?

1. Thermal insulation. Thermal insulation for Passive Houses must be extremely effective and so thick walls are built up using ‘super insulation’ to achieve high R-values. High-grade insulation ensures that the home is well insulated all year round which stops heat gained from the sun from leaking out.

What is passive design in architecture?

Passive design means designing buildings that are very ‘tight’, minimizing interior sources of poor air quality such as combustion appliances and off-gassing materials, and providing filtered ventilation with outside air.

What are the five main building techniques related to Passive House design a?

Fundamental to the energy efficiency of these buildings, the following five principles are central to Passive House design and construction: 1) superinsulated envelopes, 2) airtight construction, 3) high-performance glazing, 4) thermal-bridge-free detailing, and 5) heat recovery ventilation.

What are the Passivhaus standards?

Windows: Energy efficient glazing and frames should have U-values not exceeding 0.80 W/m2K. Stringent levels of airtightness: Air leakage through unsealed joints must be less than 0.6 air changes per hour @50 Pa (equivalent of an air permeability of less than 1m3/m2/h @50 Pa)

What type of insulation is used in a passive house?

What are the Passivhaus construction methods?

After your introduction to these fundamental concepts, you reach the heart: 8 fully-illustrated Passivhaus construction methods: Solid concrete with rendered external insulation Insulated concrete formwork Solid masonry with Larsen trusses Masonry cavitywall Timber Frame with Larsen Trusses Timber I Joist Frame SIPS panels Timber Frame.

What is the Passivhaus standard?

The Passivhaus standard uses the precision of building physics to ensure reduced energy costs and demand, comfortable and healthy living conditions, with a high standard of energy efficiency that exceeds government regulations.

What is the best book for Passivhaus construction detailing?

“ Details for Passive Houses: A Catalogue of Ecologically Rated Constructions ” is an excellent reference for successful Passivhaus construction detailing. The book has six chapters, a glossary, appendices and a section of relevant advertising at the back.

What does a Passivhaus architect do?

The architect of a Passivhaus may therefore produce designs based on typical UK constructions, such as timber frame or masonry cavity wall.