Energy savings, quality and confort at home, ¿is it possible?
- 3 feb 2017
- 4 Min. de lectura
"It's colder at home than out there”, "I couldn’t sleep tonight, it was too warm”, "you’ve to pay for everything on the electricity bill". These are daily common expressions that are solved in a very simple way: raising up the heating or raising up the cooling and then I pay more this month, what can we do. Many other people think of doing a "good" house refurbishment, and others think of asking for a budget for making a refurbishment of the building, this way everyone will have saving. Basically, all of us are all looking for the same ending: savings, quality and comfort; and why not, modernized and remove partitions. But to achieve this, we must stop doing the same thing.
Innovation is a trending topic word, but in the construction world there are already enough tools, techniques and technology to achieve saving, quality and comfort. The construction of the future come a few years ago. The trend in the present walks towards the nearly zero energy buildings, nZEBs. In fact, some Public Administrations in our continent have resolved as local regulations that all new buildings, public and private, must be nZEB. Here you can see some examples by visiting the citations: Frankfurt, Antwerp, Rathdown (Ireland), Brussels.
These measures are taken following the requirements set by the European Commission in the National Energy Efficiency Action Plans (NEEAPs) and also in this package of measures: Clean Energy for all Europeans. Basically, these documents require that by 2020, Europe have to reduce the annual energy demand by 20%. And by 2030 must be reduced by 40%.
¿And what about Spain? ¿what are we going to do? ¿will we be able to achieve the EU objectives? For that, in the field of construction we have our own regulation document which is always on our rich: El Código Técnico de la Edificación (CTE), in english Technical Building Code. The CTE is going to have a considerable change in 2018 towards energy efficiency. More information in our Blog. And point out that, sooner rather than later, public and non-public buildings should be built as a nearly zero energy consumption. In this way, if you currently have a nZEB you can supply it with an installation of photovoltaic panels and batteries so you end out with a self-sufficient building. But, ¿what about the self-consumption law in Spain? This law does not apply to those installations that are completely disconnected from the electricity grid. But, disconnecting from the electricity grid means being 100% sure that at any time of year we will not need such a service. Reaching the goal of being completely self-sufficient energetically is risky and difficult, but it can be done. A good research and project, savings, quality and comfort are very achievable. Hereunder we can see a correct direction that can be taken to arrive to achieve a nZEB.
To achieve the requirements of a nZEB, Passive House standard is already a famouse tool. When you own a Passive House means that it has been certified by the German Passivehaus Institut, which is in charge of ensuring that your building follows and will follow all the requirements:
- Heating or cooling demand ≤ 15 kWh/m2 year.
- Heating or cooling load < 10 W/m2.
- Airtightness ≤ 0.6 rpm
- Total primary energy demanded ≤ 120 kWh/m2 year.
- Overheating (25°C) ≤ 10%.
In compliance with these requirements, you can be assured that your building will reach the objectives in the next CTE 18, with European regulations for 2020, 2030 and 2050. In addition, energy savings reach 90% compared to traditional construction, and 75% compared to the average of modern buildings.
Therefore, the remaining energy demand can be easily supply, for example, with photovoltaic panels. To obtain these results, Passive House is based on 5 basic principles:
- Excellent thermal insulation.
- High performance windows and doors.
- Avoid thermal bridges.
- Mechanical ventilation with heat recovery.
- Airtightness.
In addition, as a Passive House designer you have available PHPP (Passive House Planing Package), which is the official calculation tool created by the PHI (Passive House Institute). It contains everything necessary to design properly a Passive House, and gives an energy balance and the annual energy demand results.
Following this way you can ensure thar a building is going to be nZEB. It is, simply, a mode of construction. In addition, if you are an ambitious person, you can complement it with other international certificates like LEED or BREEAM. See BREEAM Project of Letter Ingenieros. Or you can even build it with a green roof as we recommend in Letter Ingenieros.
In the image below you can see the location of certified buildings under the standard Passive House.
There are many good examples which can be easily founded by googling it.
But the goal is not only to achieve savings, quality and comfort. Behind it we have many other personal and global advantages.
First we could say that the reduction of CO2 emissions will be outstanding, and would be immediately reflected in the quality of the air we breathe on the street and inside the buildings. The cloud of pollution that currently is over urban cores can be drastically reduced. On the other hand, the environmental sustainability achieved would directly affect the reduction of the greenhouse effect and the overheating. In short, a social commitment in the present will be reflected in the quality of life in the near future.
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