The Passive House Standard is a low energy building standard that relies on the principles of superinsulation and airtightness to lower the buildings energy use to roughly 90% of space conditioning demand and 60-70% of the total energy usage as compared to a building built to code. Passive House relies on energy modeling to determine the necessary design features to meet these low energy goals.  The energy model calculates gains and losses, for which the difference becomes the heating and cooling energy use.

 

Passive houses rely on some basic principles including a super-insulated envelope, airtightness test. energy and heat recovery balanced ventilation system, thermal bridge free detailing, triple pane windows with thermally broken frames, and effecient mechanical systems for heating, cooling, and hot water production.  These basic principles are adjusted for each unique design, set of circumstances, and climate location.

 

Ryan Abendroth, the prinicpal of Passive Energy Designs LLC, is an expert Passive House Consultant with five years of experience working on many passive house projects.  Through Passive Energy Designs, and previous employers, the staff at Passive Energy Designs have reviewed more than 100 projects pursuing passive house design.