1970s Arkansas & Illinois prototypes: progress towards passive house
Written by Marc O'Riain
In his latest column, Dr Marc O’Riain looks back at two American prototypes for the passive house standard that embraced heat pump technology as well as principles of superinsulation and airtightness.
Is Enerphit the key to decarbonising existing homes?
Written by Duncan Smith
With increasing attention turning to cutting carbon emissions from existing homes to meet carbon reduction targets, Duncan Smith, housing asset and energy strategy manager at Renfrewshire County Council in Scotland, argues that approaches which improve comfort and dramatically reduce energy bills must be front and centre.
It’s time to make the passive house standard a requirement of local development plans across Ireland, says Mel Reynolds.
Toby Cambray writes on the many lessons that the inimitable biscuit cake can teach us about how building materials deal with moisture.
Duncan Smith reflects on the social and architectural significance of Glasgow's tenement flats, and their potential place in a zero carbon future, as the city prepares to host COP 26.
Green Homes Grants: where did it go wrong, and what comes next?
Written by Peter Rickaby
The Green Homes Grant scheme failed because politicians failed to heed more than a decade of lessons about how to do retrofit well, writes Dr Peter Rickaby, and now there will be an even bigger hill to climb.
Dr Peter Rickaby writes on the varied and complex challenges of retrofitting older buildings.
Dublin City Council built just 45 social housing units in 2019. In his latest column, Mel Reynolds analyses the state’s surprising reluctance to build its own homes.
Condensation within the structure of buildings is a lot more complex than condensation in a sweaty pub on a Friday night, writes building physics expert Toby Cambray.
As governments rush to jump-start their economies, there is a danger that important lessons for how to retrofit homes will be lost in the rush to build. But there is a better way, writes Dr Peter Rickaby.
Returning to his regular series on the evolution of sustainable building during the 20th century, Dr Marc Ó Riain takes a look at the first serious attempt to build a house with net zero energy use.
How do ventilation filters work, and can they help to protect us against Covid-19? Toby Cambray weighs in on the physics of a subject that is more complex and interesting than you might expect.
Covid-19 has inadvertently given us a glimpse of what sustainable living patterns might look like, and we must seize this opportunity for long-lasting positive change, says Dr Peter Rickaby.
We need better building performance metrics
Written by Fionn Stevenson
The way we currently do post-occupancy evaluation of buildings is inadequate, says Professor Fionn Stevenson — we need new ways to measure the environmental impact of buildings, and how resilient they are to climate change.
Towards greener homes — the role of green finance
Written by Marion Jammet
For anyone interested in climate action, the government’s commitment to halve Ireland’s emissions by 2030 and to reach carbon neutrality by 2050 was one of the highlights of the year. But we won’t reach this objective focusing exclusively on energy efficiency — we must turn our attention to cutting embodied carbon too, and this wil be a major focus of the Irish Green Building Council's Better Homes conference next Friday, 27 November.
Taking a temporary detour from his series of columns on the history of sustainable building and renewable energy, Dr Marc Ó Riain takes a look at Covid-19 from the perspective of Gaia theory, and at the relationship between collapsing ecosystems and the emergence of new infectious diseases.
Zero in - technical virtual tour of a net zero passive house "plus"
Written by News Desk
Architect Mel Reynolds's stunning new passive mews in South Dublin is featured in the new issue of Passive House Plus magazine. You can view a technically detailed virtual tour of the property below - including detailed descriptions and construction photos of the build. To view the case study in the digital version of the new issue click here (Irish edition) and here (UK edition).
Speculative effort - technical virtual tour of a developer-built Enerphit
Written by News Desk
An extraordinary A1 upgrade in Cork City is Ireland's first developer-led Enerphit. The attention to detail taken in its construction is something to behold. See below for a detailed technical virtual tour, including tags showing sequences of construction shots that reveal what makes this building so special. To view the case study in our digital magazine click here (Irish edition) and here (UK edition.
Are lower land values the silver lining of the crisis?
Written by Mel Reynolds
While the Covid-19 crisis has undoubtedly caused a huge amount of human suffering and economic damage, it has brought some upsides too. Mel Reynolds speculates on how much land prices may fall, and what the positive and negative impacts may be.