Building Net-Zero, fire resilient homes with integrity and care.

Passive Solar Building Design helps optimize a building's absorption and reflection of solar radiation through solar orientation and factors like site & location of the building and the prevailing climate, placement of windows and shading elements, choice of finishes, and incorporation of thermal mass.

The ICF wall assembly creates a very airtight envelope reducing undesired air leakage. The combination of the high thermal resistance, air tightness and thermal mass makes for a highly efficient basement where as much as 25% of a homes heat loss can occur. We are also exploring using AAC and Hemp blocks as possible alternatives to ICF.

AAC is a non-combustible concrete that is a sustainable building material with the workability of wood. AAC provides for a continuous, unbroken building envelope which is essential to achieving a Net Zero home. The combination of increased air tightness and continuous thermal envelope creates a superior building envelope which maintains the conditioned space within the optimal thermal comfort range. AAC is an economical choice since only one material is used to build walls, floors, ceilings and roofs. It is a solid long-lasting material that combines durability and mold, bug and fire resistance.

Heating and cooling systems need to be carefully matched to a high-efficiency building envelope, such as one that includes AAC. By taking advantage of the Earth’s internal temperature, geothermal pumps or ground source heat exchangers offer efficient and comfortable distribution of heat through in-floor heating and/or other systems and have the added function of heating a home’s domestic water.

PV modules and arrays are part of a system that point panels toward the sun, along with the components that take the direct-current (DC) electricity produced by modules and convert it to the alternating-current (AC) electricity used to power all of the appliances, heat pumps, exchangers, and other systems in your home.