Passive House Weekly December 5th 2022

December 5th, 2022

Please read on for a selection of Passive House happenings, articles, interviews, and developments. The featured project above is the PHI-certified Spire Landing in Vancouver, BC.

Do you have Passive House news that we should share in a future edition? Email us at: [email protected].

1. Passive House Week in Preview

WED: Carver House: A Perspective on Passive House Workforce Development

Our upcoming Project Showcase presentation will focus on Carver House, a Pilot Project for the scaling of Passive House rehabilitation of vacant row homes in Baltimore and developing a high-performance building workforce. This presentation will describe some of the workshops and collaborations that the Carver House team has undertaken and are planning in collaboration with Baltimore City Public High Schools’ CTE (Career Technical Education).

Timmy Aziz and Marc Stauffer (Requity) will discuss the development and testing of their net-zero construction curriculum, and its effectiveness in workforce placement while also creating a framework that can be replicated and scaled. The project specifics are purposeful and intended to intersect education with climate action and home ownership. Get the Zoom link

THUR: Urban Passive House Episode 3: Rubin Hall Retrofit

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Presented by New York Passive House and Passive House Accelerator, the Urban Passive House Series explores Passive House solutions and lessons learned for urban settings, drawing on built examples from major metropolises across North America.

Episode 3 features Rubin Hall. The renovation of New York University’s landmarked Rubin Hall will be one of the largest EnerPHit certified residential buildings in the world and is an exemplary project for the retrofit of millions of square feet of pre-war multifamily construction in New York. This all-electric renovation will reduce operational carbon in compliance with New York City's Local Law 97 and is a formative step to address NYU's Climate Action Plan. Michael Syracuse, Partner at FXCollaborative Architects will share the design challenges of and solutions for this innovative project. Register now

UPCOMING COMPONENT SPOTLIGHT: Building Applications & Uses for Foamed Glass Aggregate

Traves Ogilvie, Composites Business Market Manager for Aero Aggregates, will join the Accelerator to discuss using Foamed Glass Aggregate (FGA) in lieu of foam board and/or natural-stone resources as well as FGA graded aggregates (Aerolite®) for use in ready-mix concrete in lieu of natural-sand-aggregate resources. Register now

NOW LIVE: Episode 116 of the Passive House Podcast

Matthew interviews Bronwyn Barry, principal of Passive House BB and longtime board member and leader at The Passive House Network. The two dive into Bronwyn's recent presentation to COP27 in Egypt about the mutually supportive role that the international Passive House standard and building energy code development can play. She shares an analogy of Passive House as high-speed rail and code development as the local train; both are important, both ultimately reach the same direction, and the advancement of one supports the other. Listen here

NOW LIVE: Bonus Episodes, Live from PhiusCon

Thank you to Sto Corp. and Zola Windows for making the Passive House Podcast at PhiusCon 2022 possible. Listen to the next four episodes of the PhiusCon Series. More episodes to come next week!

THIS WEEK: Events In the Passive House Community

Passive House Accelerator
Carver House: A Perspective on Passive House Workforce Development (Dec 7)
Urban Passive House Episode 3: Rubin Hall (Dec 8)

iPHI
Updates to the Building Certification Criteria for Passive House, EnerPHit, and PHI Low Energy Buildings (Dec 7)

Passivhaus Trust
Large & Complex Passivhaus Masterclass Lecture Series: Steel Frame Passivhaus (December 7)

THANK YOU to this week's Featured Sponsor

Visit Mitsibushi Electric Trane US HVAC

2. Featured Article of the Week

First-Ever National Building Study Finds Air Leakage Is Major Issue

To help identify technology requirements and engineering solutions for moving the U.S. building stock toward a zero-carbon future by midcentury, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) conducted the first-ever national-level characterization study of the U.S. building stock. The study was conducted with input from the Advanced Building Construction (ABC) Collaborative, which is led by RMI. Continue reading

3. Upcoming Conferences

NAHB International Builders' Show (Jan 31-Feb 2)
NAHB International Builders’ Show® (IBS) is the largest home building show in North America. This three-day event brings professionals, products and home building trends together under one roof. Gain industry knowledge, discover new business tools and more at IBS 2023. You can experience the industry through networking events, education courses and talking with exhibitors. Discover the latest in tech, new product launches, trends and the hottest topics at IBS 2023.

BUILDEX Vancouver (Feb 15-16)
BUILDEX Vancouver is Western Canada’s largest forum connecting the holistic building industry. Our attendees join to interact, learn and discover the newest innovations from a market in constant transformation. Join industry professionals who are evolving traditions and accelerating innovation.

International Passive House Association Conference 2023 (March 10-11)
The 26th International Passive House Conference will be held in the state capital of Hesse in 2023. #EfficiencyNOW will be the focal theme of the event. The Conference will demonstrate how buildings that use very little energy for heating and cooling can be supplied with renewable energy reliably and at scale, a timely topic. The Conference will take place in person in Wiesbaden from March 10-11, 2023. Simultaneously, online events will be available. The Call for Papers is open until 2 September 2022. The event will be held under the auspice of the Minister of Economic Affairs of the German state of Hesse.

Northeast Sustainable Building Association, BuildingEnergy Boston (Mar 28-29, 2023)
BuildingEnergy Boston is a conference designed by and for practitioners in the fields of high-performance building and design, energy efficiency, and renewable energy. It brings more than 1,000 industry leaders and emerging professionals together to learn from and share ideas with each other. Sessions are curated by a volunteer NESEA-Member content committee to ensure that conference sessions are genuinely useful to attendees.

2023 Passive House Network Conference (Sep 28-Oct 6, 2023)
Participate online and in Denver Colorado!