As a ‘native’ English speaker, I find ‘passivhaus’ just curious enough for me to realise it’s something different from my passive (not moving) concrete abode.
People want comfort, safety and health, and low maintenance/durability. Resource efficiency, whether upfront or operating, is less of a concern. I just use the vague description "high performance building" and when people ask, use the first three before resource efficiency.
When I write about passive buildings, I try to always use Passivhaus® [or (R) when the medium doesn't allow the symbol]. If that triggers a "What's that?" question, a conversation begins...
The "Passive House home" comment was *meant* to raise eyebrows and supports my case: it's hard work to make a wide range of people recognise, understand and care about "Passive House" because the phrase is neither clear or appealing in its English form. That led to my recommendation that PHINZ follows the Australian example and switches to Passivhaus, should there be overwhelming support from members to do that. We certainly saw overwhelming support from those attending the conference. Cheers, Rachel Rose
Is branding a particular type of building helpful or necessary? Genuine question. I'm open to the possibility that it is but I don't take it as a given. I'm a contractor so I don't find myself able to get into the mindset of someone who just wants a home without thinking a lot about it. Personally, if I was building a house for myself today I would be taking ideas from all the different kinds of house building and mashing them together. I would definitely be taking some stuff from passivehaus but I wouldn't be slavish to that particular modality. There are lots of other great ways to do it.
Regarding insulation/ air tightness versus heat pumpification, the ladder does have a very strong advantage in that it is much cheaper, simpler and less disruptive when it comes to renovations and retrofitting. I am in the process of insulating an airtightening our 140 year old house (my pre-retrofit air exchange rate was 18 per hour!) I am loving the process and the problem solving but there is no question that it is wildly more difficult and complicated than just switching out our gas furnace for heat pumps.
I like this topic and glad you raised it. It does fall into the marketing bucket of corporate greenwashing. Nice to say you have, no idea what it actually is but if it sounds good, it sounds different then it is.
As a ‘native’ English speaker, I find ‘passivhaus’ just curious enough for me to realise it’s something different from my passive (not moving) concrete abode.
People want comfort, safety and health, and low maintenance/durability. Resource efficiency, whether upfront or operating, is less of a concern. I just use the vague description "high performance building" and when people ask, use the first three before resource efficiency.
When I write about passive buildings, I try to always use Passivhaus® [or (R) when the medium doesn't allow the symbol]. If that triggers a "What's that?" question, a conversation begins...
The "Passive House home" comment was *meant* to raise eyebrows and supports my case: it's hard work to make a wide range of people recognise, understand and care about "Passive House" because the phrase is neither clear or appealing in its English form. That led to my recommendation that PHINZ follows the Australian example and switches to Passivhaus, should there be overwhelming support from members to do that. We certainly saw overwhelming support from those attending the conference. Cheers, Rachel Rose
Is branding a particular type of building helpful or necessary? Genuine question. I'm open to the possibility that it is but I don't take it as a given. I'm a contractor so I don't find myself able to get into the mindset of someone who just wants a home without thinking a lot about it. Personally, if I was building a house for myself today I would be taking ideas from all the different kinds of house building and mashing them together. I would definitely be taking some stuff from passivehaus but I wouldn't be slavish to that particular modality. There are lots of other great ways to do it.
Regarding insulation/ air tightness versus heat pumpification, the ladder does have a very strong advantage in that it is much cheaper, simpler and less disruptive when it comes to renovations and retrofitting. I am in the process of insulating an airtightening our 140 year old house (my pre-retrofit air exchange rate was 18 per hour!) I am loving the process and the problem solving but there is no question that it is wildly more difficult and complicated than just switching out our gas furnace for heat pumps.
I like this topic and glad you raised it. It does fall into the marketing bucket of corporate greenwashing. Nice to say you have, no idea what it actually is but if it sounds good, it sounds different then it is.