That's why at RDH we're always strong in sending a lot of our modelers inside, as well. I'd say that energy modelers have been described as the glue of the project before. You are the messenger of how design and construction teams are using the energy budgets. Cost consultants are the messengers of how the team is using their budget.
To be a good messenger, you must understand a little bit of everything. For sure that starts from behind a desk, digging into every single discipline like drawings and specification, but it does get better by also going to the site and seeing what the product is. It creates that feedback loop, so for the next project, your assumptions are even more on point and accurate and realistic. You never stop learning.
PHA: What are some of the larger obstacles to the adoption of Passive House standards? Could you also identify some of the potential solutions?
MS: One of the main barriers to mass-scale implementation is the way we approach the design and construction of our buildings. One way to resolve that issue is by making the process more collaborative. Even before the massing is set up or rough architectural plans are drawn, you have to get everybody around the table and set clear budgets. This includes financial budgets, but also energy budgets and carbon budgets.
This kind of enhanced collaborative approach ensures everyone is working towards a shared goal rather than in silos, and it’s a strategy that works independently of the team’s experience with high-performance building. Even if the project isn’t a high-performance building, enhanced collaboration can give you both cost and performance optimization. The more you depart from it, the more you might lose out on one or the other.
PHA: How do you help guide developers and owners in instances where finance and performance may be at odds?
MS: Everyone on the project needs to understand where the industry is going, including the owners. When you start a project, be it a new build or a retrofit, they’re pouring a large amount of capital into that asset, and they’re usually not going to have the financial opportunity to do a major update for several decades. This means we have to show them what kind of changes to the climate and the regulatory environment they will face in the interim—between now and when an update becomes viable—and they can then make an informed decision about how much they want to plan for these contingencies. They cannot look at the past anymore because that will get you in trouble. It is not representative of the future.
When we act as that type of messenger, even if we don't have all the answers, we tend to have constructive discussions with owners. From their perspective, high-performance building also begins to make a lot more sense financially.
PHA: Moving on from building better buildings, how can we start to bring in a more diverse group of people to the construction industry?
MS: While I consider myself lucky because I was “raised” by the Passive House community, and the Passive House community has been a lot more inclusive than other communities in my experience, you have to ask, “Is it enough?” I think the answer is no. We need to bring more awareness to the topic. I think several organizations, like the Passive House Network and others, have done a good job recently, but we need to make diversity the new norm no matter if it’s having equal representation on a panel at a conference or in a firm. We still have a lot of work to do.
Another item that is incredibly important is mentorship for women. I've seen this work well internally within RDH and other organizations, as well as externally. Mentorships provide an avenue where women can share things that might not always be appropriate to discuss in a work environment. Younger women can learn a lot from those who have spent years working in the industry.
Additionally, I think we need to reconceptualize what we mean by providing access for women and individuals from traditionally marginalized communities. We need to be more proactive. We should be reaching out to people from these communities to try to rebalance the scale a little bit, and I think this begins with awareness and accountability, and that's on all of us, right? We've talked a lot about collaboration, and I think that collaboration looks very different when you have diverse people around the table. It looks a lot better because people from different backgrounds offer different perspectives that can challenge conventional wisdom and remove these narrow lenses often worn by people in privileged positions.
As much as the Passive House community is using building science to address the climate crisis, we have to remember the climate crisis is rooted in social injustice and environmental injustice. We might not feel that we have control over these other issues, but I do believe that they're all tied together, and we need to consider them all if we are to make a better world. We can’t solve one without solving the other—that’s not going to count as a win.
At the end of the day, we're all here to pursue the same goal and we have to remember that we’re better and stronger together. Having these conversations helps us remember where we are, what we can do, and that we always have our north star shining and guiding us.
This interview was edited for length and clarity. To hear the entire two-part interview, check out the Passive House Podcast page for part one and part two.
