Blue2 Open House Green Building Mixer | Thursday, July 8, 2010

GREEN BUILDING SHOWCASE and MIXER
Blue2 Open House Green Building Mixer

LEED for Homes and Green Point Rating meet Passive House; the making of the first Passive House in CA which will also be LEED H and GPR certified.

This will be a celebration and mixer of both the USGBC-REC, USGBC-NCC, Build It Green, and Passive House CA. The architect and builder will present a technical overview of what makes this a Passive House, Prudence Ferreira and Kevin Beck will discuss, respectively, the relationship between LEED and Green Point Rated with the Passive House standards, and other presenters to be determined.

When: Thursday, July 8, 6 p.m. to 8 p.m.
Where: Blue2 House, 11560 California 1, Pt Reyes Station
(Please park next door at West Marin School. Note: This is a home. Please, no random site visits.)
Cost: $10 for members of the participating organizations, $15 for all others
Register: here
Please direct questions to clamtour@passivehouseca.org
Participating organizations:
Passive House Ca
Build It Green
USGBC Redwood Empire Chapter
USGBC Northern California Chapter
Green Chamber of Commerce

Passive House:
Passive House is the German system of super low energy buildings that essentially have no furnace, and instead heat themselves with saved heat from the occupants and appliances.  The European Union has almost 20,000 of these built, and they are considering making it their required building code, whereas there are about a dozen built in the US.  Passive House typically uses less than half the energy of an Energy Star house, and is the low cost path to net zero energy buildings, meeting California’s Green House Gas Reduction AB 32 targets, and exceeding thresholds proposed in the CA PUC’s Long-term Strategic Plan.

Additionally, Passive House buildings are cost effective to construct as they rely on inexpensive efficiency measures, not less effective equipment, and cost effective to run as they have such low heating and energy requirements.  Because of their low carbon footprint, they are great for the environment.  Passive Houses have the highest quality indoor air as they are constantly supplied fresh tempered air and old air is constantly flushed.  As the temperature is constant, they have superior occupant satisfaction and comfort.  This marks the beginning of a new way of building in the US.

Blue2
Blue2 is an affordable housing unit, developed by CLAM, the Community Land Trust Association of West Marin. CLAM is linking sustainability with its mission of affordability.  By adopting the Passive House standard, they have a building with low energy costs that will lock in affordability forever, built with low construction costs.  Over half the funds for this project were raised by local, personal donations.

Besides seeking Passive House certification, Blue2 is also seeking LEED-H and Green Point Rated certifications.  It is showing how these green metrics are complimentary, with Passive House addressing the low energy aspect that the others have not had the tools to address.

Blue2 is the second unit beside the Blue1 house, which was renovated to deep energy reductions using Passive House standards.  Together, they are a small island of energy efficiency that will have lasting impact.

To learn more:
CLAM:  www.clam-ptreyes.org,
Blue2:  www.clam-bluehouseblog.blogspot.com
Passive House US:  www.passivehouse.us
Passive House California:  www.passivehouseca.org
Build It Green: www.builditgreen.org
USGBC Redwood Empire Chapter:  www.usgbc-rec.org
USGBC Northern California Chapter:  www.usgbc-ncc.org