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  • HPH085 : 10 Environmental Design Myths – with Sofie Pelsmakers from UCL

    HPH085 : 10 Environmental Design Myths – with Sofie Pelsmakers from UCL

    Sofie Pelsmakers, environmental architect and doctoral researcher at University College London (UCL), busts 10 common environmental design myths. This also serves as a good introduction to The Environmental Design Pocketbook.

    Sophie-Pelsmakers-outside-UCL

     

    Interview with Sofie Pelsmakers

    Sofie Pelsmakers is passionate about contextual design, with the focus very much on minimising our impact on the planet. She was inspired to write The Environmental Design Pocketbook after realising there was no single resource that had summed up the arguments and also pointed to deeper reading.

     

    Download Sofie’s PDF

    In this session Sofie is dispelling 10 environmental design myths. She has also put together this bonus PDF for further reading.

     

    Myth 1: “Climate Change is in The Future”

    With Met Office and NASA data showing that all of the UK’s warmest years have been in the last decade, it is evident that climate change is already here. So the notion that we’re designing for the distant future is wrong.

    The job for designers is making sure that buildings in the future will still be performing to the standard they were designed for and that they’re fit for purpose. Ideally we should be designing buildings that take into account future changes in climate or that can be adapted if necessary.

     future climatechangeHow future climates may vary (copyright The Environmental Design Pocketbook)

     

    Myth 2: “What if Global Warming is Not as Bad as Predicted?”

    If we’re wrong about climate change then the worst that can happen is that we’ll have designed better buildings that function in this climate and in any in the future.

    Joel Pitt cartoonCopyright Joel Pitt

     

    Myth 3: “Green Roofs – Are They Green?”

    This depends on the kind of green roof, in which part of the country and how well shaded and protected it is. There isn’t one solution suitable for all situations in all regions.

    Much of the sedum is imported which will have an environmental impact, and even more so if killed off from being used in the wrong position (perhaps being unable to survive on a thin roof in the south east of England during a drought) and needing to be replaced.

    Sofie states the current fashion is of thinking if a building “looks green”, such as with green roofs, green walls, or renewables then surely it must be, however it is just not as simple as that.

    green-roof-at-the-muse An example of a biodiverse and intensive green roof (copyright bere:architects)

     

    Myth 4: “Green Walls”

    While they have aesthetically pleasing qualities, a massive amount of energy is actually used in circulating water and nutrients around the plants to keep them alive. Systems can fail because they’ve not been maintained properly, the plants are in very exposed areas, or exotic imported plants are used that are just not suited to the climate. With considerable resources and energy being used to keep them alive or replace them if they die, Sofie suggests a much more robust way of creating a green wall is to use plants from the ground up and along trellises and buildings.

    green-wall-at-paradise-park

    A green wall at Paradise Park

     

    Myth 5: “Micro-Renewables Such as Micro-Wind Turbines Are a Great Idea in Urban Areas”

    Sofie feels that there is a danger in sustainable design of going towards gimmicky “look at me” type renewables. In fact the energy used to make and transit a wind turbine to site can actually be greater than the energy it will ever generate, particularly if erected in an urban setting where there isn’t enough consistent wind. And despite millions being spent on renewables there can be unintended consequences, for example in some cases turbines have even been switched off because of complaints about their noise.

    suitability windturbines in urban areasThe sustainability of wind turbines in urban areas (copyright The Environmental Design Pocketbook)

     

    Myth 6: “Greywater and Rainwater – Is it Always Environmentally Sound?”

    If your sole concern is about saving water then these systems will succeed in that objective. Depending on the system used however and when you consider the embodied energy in the extra pipework, the energy used for pumping, the chemical cleaning components etc, you could end up saving very little water for a great energy cost.

    A far more effective solution would be a gravity fed system with short retention recycling which would not need the cleaning to be done mechanically.

     

    Myth 7: “Eco-Measures Lead to Energy Savings and Reduced Bills, Right?”

    Using a greywater recycling system like the example above, it is evident that bills could actually increase from the costs of energy used to pump the water around, clean it and feed it back.

    An unintended consequence is that we think that eco-measures will save energy but actually in a lot of cases people then behave differently.

     

    Myth 8: “Does a Zero-Energy Building Mean its Environmental Impact is Zero?”

    While we may save carbon from energy generated onsite (and if offset with allowable solutions), a building has more environmental impacts which cannot all be measured in carbon (health, biodiversity etc.).

    Also the current definition of zero carbon acknowledges that you’d have to build at low densities. This in turn makes public transport and walking to services less viable, and increases dependence on cars.

     

    Myth 9: “If I Have Clean Renewable Energy it Doesn’t Matter How Much I Use”

    There are around 27 million buildings in the UK, many of which are built to appalling standards. While a lot of people think that there’s no need to upgrade them if we can just decarbonise the grid, they neglect to consider that the high energy demand requires considerable money and finite resources for the substantial array of renewables that would be required. There would also be ridiculous amount of space required to enable those renewables to offset an energy-inefficient building.

    [Tweet “Sofie Pelsmakers: “Energy efficiency should be the first consideration before renewables.””].

    Renewable Energy

     

    Myth 10: “Retrofit of Existing Buildings = Unneeded and Boring”

    With such a large number of buildings built to a poor standard there is a fundamental need for them to be upgraded in order to meet our 2050 carbon budgets and to address the problems of fuel poverty.

    Sofie feels that many architects find retrofitting unrewarding and complicated due to limitations such as expense and existing structure. She argues that actually it brings the architect back to the base principles of insulation details, airtightness and thermal bridging that are often forgotten.

     

    Find Out More

    Find out more about The Environmental Design Pocketbook

    Follow Sofie Pelsmakers on Twitter (Sofie tweets so much great stuff!)

     

    Transcript

    Download a transcript of the interview with Sofie Pelsmakers.

     

    Please Connect With Me

  • HPH040 : Is the Passivhaus Standard a World Standard? – with Martin Holladay from Green Building Advisor (Passive House)

    HPH040 : Is the Passivhaus Standard a World Standard? – with Martin Holladay from Green Building Advisor (Passive House)

    Martin Holladay from Green Building Advisor talks about the pros and cons of the Passivhaus standard. He also explains why he believes the German standard is not the best approach for the North American climate.

    Martin-Holladay

     

    Interview with Martin Holladay

    Martin Holladay is a senior editor at Green Building Advisor and Fine Homebuilding magazine, and he reports on topics relating to energy-efficient residential construction. 

    He started out as a builder and remodeler, building single family homes, additions and renovations in Northern Vermont in the United States.

    About 15 years ago he got into publishing, first as an editor at the Journal of Light Construction and then later at Energy Design Update.  

    House-built-in-1974 Martin built his first house in 1974

     

    Martin’s First House was a Learning House

    Martin describes the first house he built for himself and how it followed passive solar principles. It was not an airtight construction though.

    He calls this a ‘classic hippy house’ in the sense that it was thrown together with found materials and inexpensive items that he picked up from the dump.

     

    The Solar Years

    Martin explains some of the history of how green building advanced through the years.

    As early as the 1940s, MIT researchers were looking at different ways of collecting solar energy.

    Active solar systems used pumps and blowers as well as some mechanism for storing solar heat.

    Martins says: “If it was a solar air system the heat was usually stored in a rock bin, usually in the basement which was literally a large bin of rocks through which heated air would be blown. Then the air would later be blown through the rocks on a cold night and some of the heat would be gathered up that way or more commonly in large tanks of water. And solar collectors on the roof, water collectors or air collectors would – with means of pumps or blowers – transfer this heat to the storage system.”

     

    Passive Solar Homes

    Passive solar houses aimed to use the design of the house to maximise solar gain and not use pumps or blowers.

    With most of the windows on the south side of the house and fewer on the north, Martin says these houses heated up quite nicely on a clear sunny day.

    There were drawbacks though. They lost a tremendous amount of heat on cold winter nights because of the large amounts of south facing glazing. So they had the reputation of being uncomfortably hot on sunny days and uncomfortably cold at night!

    Saskatchewan-Conservation-House The Saskatchewan Conservation House was built in 1977

     

    The Saskatchewan Conservation House was a Breakthrough

    Instead of just gathering solar energy, this house also experimented with super insulation. So it was a house that was built on airtight principles and was tested at about 0.6 air changes per hour at 50 pascals.

    It had R40 walls, R60 ceilings and used triple-glazed windows. Clearly these types of specifications have been recommended ever since in cold northern climates (for super insulated houses).

    In 1985 The Superinsulated Home Book (affiliate link) was released and a whole movement advocating super insulated houses took off.

     

    The Traditional Approach to Passive Solar Home Design was Abandoned or Modified

    Martin explains that at this stage there were two opposing views of the best way to build a low energy house.

    “The traditional passive solar people thought that you could get there by collecting lots of energy and the super insulation people thought that collection of energy was not really the issue. The issue was building a tight enough envelope that you didn’t lose energy and on balance I think the super insulated group has been proven correct and a lot of the early ideas of so-called solar house design have long since been abandoned or modified.”

     

    The Passivhaus Standard Requires Cold Climate Builders to Invest in an Extraordinary Amount of Insulation

    Martin believes that the goals for annual energy use required by the Passivhaus standard – the most famous of which is 15 kWh per m2 per year – are fairly arbitrary.

    He continues: “By pegging an energy budget on the standard he [Dr Feist] required cold climate builders to invest an extraordinary amount of money in insulation that will never foreseeably be recovered in any possible energy savings.

    “When true believers in the US started copying the Germans using the Central European standard in our climates they were ending up with 14 inches of rigid foam under their concrete slabs, they were ending up with R100 insulation in their attics and they were sometimes paying $6,000 or $10,000 for reducing tiny amounts of annual energy use that could easily have been supplied by a $400 solar panel producing electricity. It was this kind of absurdity that created a backlash in North America.”

    For this reason Martin says the Passivhaus standard has no global validity.

    Cellulose insulation Cellulose insulation

     

    The More Insulation You Use, The Less Effective it Becomes

    Insulating infinitely does not make sense, so there will be a point where it is no longer cost effective.

    For example, doubling the thickness of the insulation will cut the heat loss in half, but each time it’s doubled it’ll mean spending more and saving less energy.

    We can only estimate how much to spend on insulation.

    Martin explains: “You guess at the lifespan of the building, you guess future energy costs, you put a dollar figure on the amount of energy you will pay over the lifetime of the building and you try not to spend more on insulation than will ever be saved in energy.”

     

    Global Warming Mitigation Efforts Need to be Cost Effective

    While it could be argued that very thick insulation saves the planet, if this is only includes houses for the wealthy – that are extraordinarily expensive – this is probably not a wise investment.

    Money should be focussed where it has the greatest potential to reduce CO2 levels.

     

    Passivhaus is Not a Religion

    While Martin praises the Passivhaus standard for focussing on the right things, he says it’s not a religion and it shouldn’t be blindly followed.

    He also hopes that it doesn’t become enshrined into building codes because it takes away flexibility from builders. 

    wind-turbines

     

    There Needs to be a Massive Investment in Renewable Energy

    In order to preserve the planet for our kids, it is a must that we become free of fossil fuels.

    This means a huge investment in photovoltaic arrays, wind turbines, tidal energy (to some extent) and so on.

     

    Local Communities Need to Embrace Renewable Energy

    Martin is troubled by the fact that in the US it is becoming increasingly difficult to site renewable energy installations.

    This is because local interests oppose wind turbines and in some cases PV installations as well because they are afraid that it will be a blot on the landscape. Unfortunately this comes at a time when we need to be moving at a faster pace, not a slower pace.

     

    Efficient New Homes Alone Will Not Impact Our Climate Crisis

    The timetable for building new homes is an entirely different timetable from the one required by our climate crisis.

    Martin stresses we have to get a handle on this crisis within the next 10 or 15 years, or we are very much in trouble.

    So building new super insulated homes does not address this issue. It is weatherization (or retrofitting) of existing homes that will be most significant.

    There are clearly many other things that could be done outside construction. 

     

    Listener Questions

    1. Juraj Mikurcik asked, “What’s the biggest barrier in the uptake of large-scale, multi family Passivhaus in the US?”

    2. David Cummings asked,”What are your thoughts on the marriage between natural building and Passivhaus and embodied energy?”

    3. Thomas Langley asked, “Is it better to pay the extra money to go all the way to Passivhaus standard or do as builders all recommend and compromise on airtightness to save money?”

     

    Transcript

    Download a transcript of the interview with Martin Holladay.

     

    Our Question for the Comments Section

    Is getting Passivhaus certification important for your project?

     

    Las-Vegas

    New York, New York – Las Vegas

    Back From New Media Expo

    I’ve been in the United States on a business trip to attend New Media Expo. It was very worthwhile and I met some amazing people who are also trying to change the world for the better with their blogs, podcasts and online videos. Unfortunately at the end of the conference, perhaps due to information overload and a lack of sleep, I had a psychotic episode and ended up in hospital.

    Although I want to tell you this story (if you’re interested) I did not feel that the House Planning Help Podcast was the right place to do it. Luckily, Ellory Wells, invited me onto his podcast and I shared the tale with him.

     

    My Empty Flight Back from Las Vegas

    I said in the introduction to this podcast that I was shocked by how few people were on my plane travelling between Las Vegas and London Gatwick. Here is the proof! This photo was taken in the air and has not been doctored.

    Empty-aircraft

    There must be a better way of organising flights so that planes are always at capacity?

     

    Please Connect With Me

  • Why Content Marketing is Crucial in the Fight Against Climate Change

    This blog post, which has been forming in my mind over the last week, could be quite a long one. Half of me thinks I shouldn’t be publishing it on House Planning Help (and on Regen Media instead), yet the other half feels that I have a duty to do it here, even if I fail to communicate my message. I know that my blog is about energy-efficient homes and I’m trying to become someone of value in this area but I’ve also been thinking about the bigger problem of climate change.

    Let me rewind a bit. My background is in media and I don’t think this interest will ever go away, nor would I want it to. Part of my decision not to continue a path in radio was because I believed things were changing and the opportunities for presenters were reducing each year. Of course, the Internet has had a big impact on traditional media. This is not surprising. It’s happened across most industries.

    I Always Keep Learning

    I really enjoy learning and over the last few years I have spent as much spare time as I can afford reading, watching and listening to material that I believe will help me grow. I’m sure lots of ambitious people do this. So when I was made redundant from my last job I had a fairly clear idea that I wanted to set up a business and that its heart had to be focussed on climate change, the most pressing problem we all face. I know people don’t like talking about this but as the stakes get higher I want to be doing whatever I can to help lessen the impact. Now that I’ve started I regret not doing all this sooner.

    In the future our generation may be regarded as self-centred for doing very little, even though we had the opportunity to do much more. I want to be able to say I gave it my best shot.

    Global Warming

    Knowing how the Internet can give anybody a voice I turned to content marketing to set up my platform. The subject would be house building, a topic I have always found fascinating. My focus would be energy efficiency because this is a common sense approach and there’s much more to be done, and I’d just see where it leads me. My background in television and radio probably gives me an advantage but when it boils down to it, anyone could do it. I suppose I do love making content, which is always good when it comes to content marketing!

    After 6 Months I Have The Foundations of an Online Community

    I wouldn’t say I’m the world’s best person at doing this but I’ve kept learning every step of the way. As I reach the 6-month mark I’ve created an audience out of nowhere. I’m approaching 10,000 downloads for the podcast, I’m averaging about 1000 unique users per month on the website and I’ve neglected my YouTube channel so nothing’s going on there (but it’s my aim to change that this year!). This may all seem fairly small scale – and it is – but I’m moving in the right direction and I know exactly what to do. It’s just having the time and resources to do it! I’ll get there.

    The point I’m trying to make is it’s working. So long as I keep producing great content, the community that is engaged with this content will grow. There’s another way of thinking of it, that you attract these people because you make a connection. That’s why this form of marketing is so powerful because you build up trust before you then use that trust for a purpose. In most cases that has been about selling a product or service at the end. I personally feel that’s not the only use of that influence. It could be used to tackle a bigger goal. Before we get to this bit I need to go back to last week.

     

    Influence-based Marketing Could Help My Local Town

    I’m part of a group called ‘The Future of Hertford’. Hertford is the town where I live and I want to do whatever I can to help Hertford grow. In my mind the feel of the town has changed quite a lot, even in the 8 years that I’ve been here. I’m sure places will always get better and worse – it’s a cycle. I wanted to join this group to see if I could have a positive impact in any way. Over the last year we’ve been putting together ideas and have been taking our time to get the strategy right to plot out our town’s future.

    In many respects our town is lucky because it has so much going for it, but where it’s struggling – and I think this is happening everywhere – is that shops are closing down because of pressure from the Internet. I don’t know what it was about this particular meeting or perhaps it’s where I am in my knowledge of content marketing but I suggested we play the Internet at its own game: use it – the influence from content marketing – to attract people back into the town. The minute I came up with the idea, I got very excited. I knew that, if done correctly, it would work. All we needed was a niche. In this case, I suggested that we make that topic about regenerating towns. Like I’ve done with House Planning Help we, as a town, could start an investigation into discovering what the answers are. Everyone in our group is so passionate that I can’t see how we won’t generate some amazing content. Great content means attracting an online community. We also have the benefit that local people will probably be interested in content that is about Hertford, so our online community is likely to have its most loyal following in the town. As we build up the online community it’s up to us how we use the influence after that.

    There was a strange atmosphere in the room. I imagine there were those who didn’t have a clue what I was talking about and a handful of people who could understand I was onto something. As if to emphasise the point a reporter from the local paper, who I didn’t even know was attending this meeting, jumped up and came over to me to ask if I could do an interview. I smiled to myself, as I could see this would make a nice story for him (content).

    Ben-in-paper

     

    Perhaps because I’ve worked in an industry that constantly demands content, I have a better sense of it.

     

    Climate Change is Happening

    I was quite excited for the rest of the day, but I couldn’t stop my brain thinking. Could content marketing go further? Could it reach a higher purpose? And that’s when I wondered the big question, could it help tackle climate change in any way? If you’re a climate change doubter then watch this short video.

     

    I’m not really bothered why climate change has happened, because that’s the past, but I am interested in what it means for the future. Is there anything we can do to stop this temperature rise? As I’ve found out more during the House Planning Help Podcasts my personal view is that everything’s already gone too far and we will see significant rises in sea level (that will be devastating). You may hold a different view. Either way, we have to change how we live on this planet as fossil fuels are depleting with every day that goes by, as well. We can start now while it’s easier (and a choice) or learn the hard way when life is also tougher. I feel that whatever is coming is a reminder that we are just another species on the planet and not above nature’s laws.

    We Have to Change How we Live on This Planet

    If we can avoid further global temperature rises, then we have to coordinate this lifestyle change on the biggest scale ever known. This cannot only be told to people but must be embraced by them, so that it is second nature. We have to start with the end in mind. What will our lives look like in the future if we, as individuals, are not contributing to climate change? The sad reality is it’s a gigantic paradigm shift. I know my Carbon footprint needs reducing, but do I have the courage to do everything that’s required? I don’t have the answer to this question yet but I hope I can find that courage. I’m certainly taking steps in the right direction.

    Getting back to the global picture for a moment, I do feel I’ve figured out something. The Internet has arrived just at a time when we need it most. We need to penetrate the minds of everyone on this planet, instilling the message that we each have a responsibility: we are in this together. It’s still a long shot but we can’t give up.

    Marketing Has Changed

    So, let’s get back to content marketing. It’s in its infancy, really. Think of the Internet as a field of dreams. You can own a part of the Internet but only one part, a niche. The early adopters have already built significant communities. They try to sell information-based products on the whole, because that’s the easiest thing to do. Of course, their strategies will work with any product. It’s all about influence. There are niches that are filling up: how to make money online, how to do content marketing, how to podcast, how to blog, how to use social media, etc. What happens is people, almost with celebrity status, become known as the ‘go to’ people for a given niche. You have to remember that this is all about the world, not just in England, America, China, Nepal, wherever . . . That’s why people are scrambling to get themselves out there.

    Online future

    There’s nothing to say how long this will continue because if everyone did it no content would ever get consumed, or perhaps only the best content. At present, it works and many niches remain untouched or only in their early days.

    Why am I sharing this with you? I think it’s because the early adopters will always have more influence. The reason for this is because they have given us brilliant advice. They are the people that have helped us advance in some way and for that reason we will always be grateful (unless they do something untoward to lose this status). That means that a pyramid is forming in each niche, where the person at the top is the most influential. I’ve already heard one brand saying things like: ‘The number 1 Internet marketing and business show since 2005‘. This is because they want to make it clear where they are in this chain.

    It’s Time to Get Our Priorities Straight

    In my mind the most important issue of our generation is the environment and therefore our best hope of influencing people to change their ways is if ‘the people with the right way of approaching the topic’ are at the top of these pyramids for their given niches. I don’t think it matters what your niche is but it does matter that you’re near the top of this pyramid.

    I’m taking a big risk here in looking stupid if I’m wrong, but I don’t think I am.

    Creating a Platform Doesn’t Happen Overnight

    Another fundamental in the process of content marketing is that it doesn’t happen overnight. Think of a tree. If you want a tree today then you should have planted the seeds years ago. The next best time to plant those seeds is today. Content marketing works in the same way. You need to build a platform (which is effectively a community of people) and that takes time.

    perfect tree and blue sky

    I’m not denying that this is hard work and a never ending process, but there are currently rewards for those who do it.

    Having attracted YOU as an audience I hope you are getting to know me as someone who is genuine. I’m only sharing this information because I feel we need more focus on the topic of climate change. It is not going away.

    I’ve picked my niche and I will continue to produce content about energy-efficient homes. There is still time for you to enter this area or others. I don’t want anyone to rush into this but if this blog post has got you thinking, then my one call to action is to find out about a handful of people. I personally believe their podcasts to be their most powerful form of communication, but they are everywhere online.

    Smart Passive Income – Pat Flynn

    This is Your Life – Michael Hyatt

    Internet Business Mastery – Jeremy Frandsen and Jason Van Orden

    Everything you need from them is FREE. Be warned, they will try to sell to you! Just listen to how they use their influence. The process is very clever. I haven’t bought anything from them but I have consumed enough of their content to feel that I owe them something. There are many, many other people who are harnessing this marketing approach, but I’ve chosen these people because I trust them the most (famous last words!).

    The Right Influence Could Just Change People’s Attitudes

    My idea is to build up influential people across any and every niche going (where your personal passion lies) . . . but with a common thread, these people realise that change in how we live is inevitable. By portraying this new lifestyle in as many different places as possible, greater change could occur.

    I would love to know what you make of this. If I have wasted your time then I apologise, but I felt compelled to share these thoughts. My biggest hope is persuading you by my action. If I can amass a sizeable of community of people who care about building better, more efficient houses, then that should say something.

     

    What lifestyle changes are you making? How can we shift attitudes worldwide?