This weekend marks the NetZero Home tour.  Last year a couple friends and I went on an exciting bike tour to see the different styles and design elements of each gorgeous home.  This weekend, Raising Spaces will be showcasing some fantastic products and materials at 7615 111 st.  The Belgravia Homes, as seen in the Raising Spaces “Building the Ultimate Green Effect Homes” will also be a part of the tour, so if you missed the construction tour, now’s the chance to check out sustainable home building at its finest.  Click Here for details on tour information.

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Mill Creek NetZero Home Heat Recovery Ventilator

I heard a story once about a man who built a house using insulated concrete forms (ICFs). While I don’t advocate their use in general, ICFs have some distinct advantages (certainly over conventional construction). The primary of these advantages is supreme air tightness. ICF homes (those that are built with ICFs from top to bottom) can achieve hourly air change rates of 0.2. In contrast, the Mill Creek NetZero Home has an airtightness measurement of 0.36 ACH, which is really amazing for a wood-framed house. Continue Reading →

The best way that I can think of to add a large amount (20+ tonnes) of thermal mass to a solar home is by adding concrete floors. By doing this, one can get two uses, thermal storage and a finished floor,  out of the same investment. Furthermore, since the mass of a concrete floor is so spread out around the home, thereby giving it a large surface area with which to absorb and release heat, it really is the ideal thermal storage medium for a house with large solar gains. Continue Reading →

The Mill Creek NetZero Home is substantially completed.

The stucco is finished on the outside. We went with a cement-based stucco because of its looks and durability.

Peter Amerongen built a brick wall behind the wood burner. We used the bricks from the foundation of the house that used to be standing on the property. This wall adds more thermal mass (to capture both solar and wood heat) to the house, as well as a bit of history. Continue Reading →

The importance of air tightness in building construction cannot be overstated. Very few factors affect energy performance in a cold climate more than air moving in and out of a building.

The Mill Creek Net Zero Home (MCNZ) has achieved an air tightness test result of 0.36 air changes per hour (ACH) at a pressure of 50 Pascal. In other words, when it’s really cold out, which creates a big pressure difference between the inside and the outside of a house, the 0.36 of the air in the MCNZH would leak out and be replaced with cold air over the course of an hour. It has the equivalent of a 13.8 square inch hole in it leaking air all of the time. Continue Reading →

The construction of today’s modern house expends a lot of energy and creates a lot of waste. We’ve worked hard to reduce waste while building the Mill Creek NetZero Home.

Wood

Green Door Builders framed the home, and along with building us a very airtight double-walled system, they were extremely conscientious about keeping their waste to a minimum. Here is a picture of 100% of the OSB waste that they created:

(a tiny pile of OSB waste, considering that a 2000+ sq. ft. home was framed with OSB sheathing)

Our LEED inspector was very impressed with this tiny pile. Continue Reading →