Energy Comes from the Sun, Wind, and Earth in This Vermont LEED Platinum Home

Multiple renewable-energy sources help a Vermont home built with more or less conventional methods reach net-zero-energy use

To build a house with no carbon emissions and zero-net-energy use, the owners of this rural home in Vermont employed a strategy embracing alternative energy sources, unusually high insulation values, and conscientious fabrication.

Start with a good team and a purpose
David Pill is an architect, so he and his wife Hillary went into this project with a head start. They retained builder Jim Huntington, who had experience building energy-efficient homes and is himself a designer. Schooled in self-sustaining and socially responsible lifestyle choices, they wanted to purchase materials locally, recycle, and reuse as often as possible. Something creative would also have to be done with a derelict 14,000-square-foot covered riding arena on the 44-acre plot.

That they were successful in meeting their goals might be measured by a net gain in electricity — 192 kWh in 2008, several notable awards, and designation as the first LEEDLeadership in Energy and Environmental Design. LEED for Homes is the residential green building program from the United States Green Building Council (USGBC). While this program is primarily designed for and applicable to new home projects, major gut rehabs can qualify. Platinum home in the state. It might also be measured by how great the place feels to live in.

Matching their plan to their needs
David points out that before they did anything else, they hired Andy Shapiro, an energy consultant, to model a best-case scenario, including orientation, passive solar design, massing, surface area, structural square footage, thermal massHeavy, high-heat-capacity material that can absorb and store a significant amount of heat; used in passive solar heating to keep the house warm at night. , envelope design, glazingWhen referring to windows or doors, the transparent or translucent layer that transmits light. High-performance glazing may include multiple layers of glass or plastic, low-e coatings, and low-conductivity gas fill., air tightness, mechanical systems, lighting, and appliances. They then weighed possible building strategies from technical perspectives, as well as an important programmatic one — the family of four, including two children, would be spending most of their time living and working here. They settled on the premise of an ultra-efficient all-electric house (including appliances) to keep the design simple and the fuel source unified. To implement this, they commissioned a wood-frame house and installed a 10-kW net-metered wind turbine.

Local vernacular makes sustainable sense
On a sunny day the temperature of the 2,700-square-foot interior doesn’t drop below 70°F, even when it's –10°F outside and the heat is turned off. Air conditioning is completely unnecessary in summer; the home's ample thermal mass keeps it cool, and a few open windows upstairs send breezes through the house. Simple, but not austere, one wing is highlighted by fir columns reclaimed from a local mill, and the warmth of the locally made maple cabinetry throughout is enhanced by bright rugs and natural finishes.

The two-story house is laid out as two intersecting rectangles — one sided in painted cedar and the other in corrugated Galvalume. The look recasts the forms and textures of an agricultural heritage with clean, modern ease. The steep pitch of the standing seam metal roof sheds the heavy Vermont snows, and the large wrap-around screened porch is well used during long summer days. The wind turbine, 400 feet from the house, is barely audible.

There’s a chicken coop out back, also built to sustainable specs; a new apple orchard; and a vegetable garden. And the riding arena? It was bought by neighbors, disassembled, and reconstructed elsewhere.

Four important things
While the turbine and the ground-source heat pumpHome heating and cooling system that relies on the mass of the earth as the heat source and heat sink. Temperatures underground are relatively constant. Using a ground-source heat pump, heat from fluid circulated through an underground loop is transferred to and/or from the home through a heat exchanger. The energy performance of ground-source heat pumps is usually better than that of air-source heat pumps; ground-source heat pumps also perform better over a wider range of above-ground temperatures. (GSHP) get a lot of attention as new and exciting technologies, David has a list of things he finds just as important. Number one: solar orientation, a "no-brainer,” says David. The house is long and narrow along the true east-west axis, with simple massing.

Number two is to spend as much of the budget as possible on the shell. This one is superinsulated (EPS, denim batting, polyisocyanurate foam, and dense-packed cellulose), achieving R-values up to 58 and mitigating thermal bridgingHeat flow that occurs across more conductive components in an otherwise well-insulated material, resulting in disproportionately significant heat loss. For example, steel studs in an insulated wall dramatically reduce the overall energy performance of the wall, because of thermal bridging through the steel. . The house has been fastidiously caulked to seal the envelope. Ultra-efficient fiberglass windows employ orientation-specific glazing: South-facing glazing allows more solar gain; the north-facing windows are more insulating.

Number three is short and sweet: “Find a builder before designing the house," says David. "You want to work simultaneously with your contractor to create an integrated plan. Otherwise, you’ll be trying to retrofit a design after the fact” and, thus, coping with cost overruns.

Finally, number four is to “get the projected energy loads down as low as possible in the design process, so you’re not trying to overcome them later on.” Combine efforts. The GSHP, powered by a variable-speed drive, pumps water from a well that also provides drinking water. A GFX waste hot water heat recovery unit and highest-efficiency lighting and appliances further reduce energy usage. Several devices track energy use and efficiency: a wind data logger from NRG systems; a kWh meter on the turbine; a BTUBritish thermal unit, the amount of heat required to raise one pound of water (about a pint) one degree Fahrenheit in temperature—about the heat content of one wooden kitchen match. One Btu is equivalent to 0.293 watt-hours or 1,055 joules. meter and kWh meter on the heat pump controls; and a meter for hot water usage.

Lessons Learned

David wanted to push the economy of building the structure, so they used two-stud corners (with nailers), minimal framing for window headers, and a two-foot module for all dimensions. He thought of using a single plate and skipping the exterior sheathing, using lateral bracing instead, But Jim advised strongly against these last two, even though they are increasingly recognized as advanced framing techniques. David’s glad he listened, as winds can plow down the valley with vigor.
Because the owners went for all the bells and whistles in the GSHP assembly, installation took a lot of time, as did programming the drive that manages it. They’ll probably never use the extra lines in the radiant heat manifold that stub to the second floor — the house stays comfy from what’s in the first floor slab alone. They'll also never use the blocking in the walls for brises-soleil — it stays cool without it.

Heating system choices offer challenges and opportunites
They also want prospective alternative energy users to carefully assess the apparent cost of new technologies in context: For instance, “If you already have a well you can use [for the GSHP] and are already doing a radiant floor, the cost of it might be not much more than a standard boiler," David advises. "The benefit of a boiler is that you can put in relatively inexpensive baseboard, which itself is less costly than radiant.”

These trade-offs can get complex because the sizing of the heating system also depends on how tightly the house is sealed, among many other things. Can a non-architect manage all this? “Yes,” says David, ”but they’ll need the help of experts.” He adds, “It can be a fun learning experience.”