Passive House Weekly January 30th, 2022

January 30th, 2023

Please read on for a selection of Passive House happenings, articles, interviews, and developments. The featured project above is the Highland Park Retrofit in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

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

1. PHA Week in Preview

TUE: Achieving Passive House Levels of Airtightness with the Portascanner® AIRTIGHT

Many Passive House design principles are invisible and they are designed into the fabric of the building itself, such as a high level of airtightness. With this in mind, Coltraco Ultrasonics has developed Portascanner® Airtight, the world’s first micro air-leak detector, which uses ultrasound only. Register now

WED: 10 Steps to Designing Your First Passive House: Tips and Tricks From an Architect

New Time! 9am Vancouver / 12 noon New York / 5pm London / 6pm Darmstadt

Our new 101 Edition of PHA LIVE! explores the fundamentals of Passive House and the application of basic principles, as taught by expert designers and tradespeople. Passive House Accelerator Founder, Michael Ingui (Baxt Ingui Architects), kicks of the new series with 10 Steps to Designing Your First Passive House: Tips and Tricks From an Architect. Get the Zoom link

NOW LIVE: Episode 124 of the Passive House Podcast

Passive House Podcast cohost Matthew Cuttler-Welsh interviews Jesse Clarke, Innovation and R&D Manager at Pro Clima in New Zealand and Australia, about his pathway to Passive House and the healthy building movement. The question "why?" has played a key role in Jesse's journey of discovery in building science and building regulations. In the conversation, Jesse shares the "cascade of intervention" from insulation to airtightness to vapor and moisture management, and his recent work to help Australia include airtightness in its building code in 2019 and the ASHRAE 160 standard in 2022. Listen here

Special Passive House Component Episode

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Passive House Podcast cohost Zack Semke interviews Adam White, CEO and Founder of Intelligent Membranes, maker of the Passive Purple line of intelligent liquid membranes for Passive House airtightness and water and vapor management. Adam shares his background as a builder, the near-death experience that led him down the pathway to becoming a manufacturer of liquid-applied membranes, the many fruits of his serial entrepreneurship, and even a bit about the Magna Carta! Listen here

THIS WEEK: Events in the Passive House Community

Passive House Accelerator
Achieving Passive House Levels of Airtightness with the Portascanner® AIRTIGHT (Jan 31)
10 Steps to Designing Your First Passive House: Tips and Tricks From an Architect (Feb 1)

International passive House Association
Passive House Hospitals and Health Care Centres (Feb 1)

Passive House Network
Join the California Zoning Holiday (Feb 1)

Passive House School
Certified Passive House Designer Course (Feb 1)

Do you have a recent Passive House and/or high performance project that demonstrates PH principles, electrification, low embodied carbon and high performance construction? Submit here to be featured in a future edition of Passive House Weekly, Podcast or LIVE! program.

THANK YOU to this week's Featured Sponsor

Visit Prosoco

2. Featured Article of the Week

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Building a Community That Gives Back

The city of Northampton, Massachusetts, is perhaps best known for being an academic hub. It is home to Smith College, one of the most respected liberal arts institutions in the country, and within just a few miles of four additional schools that make up the Five College Consortium. 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. Join Shaun St-Amour, frequent cohost of Passive House Accelerator LIVE!, at IBS.

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!