Passive House Northwest

Be sure to check out the events page for details on our upcoming Passive House Conference to be held this month in Olympia (register by March 12th for the best rate).   I thought about our upcoming conference as I wandered through the Seattle Home Show last week. There were so many vendors and so much to see. I was struck by the idea that one day, given a strong growth in Passive House construction that there would be a strong focus on the types of products that we are looking to know more about. I was only able to visit part of the Home Show while I was there but I did talk to a few of the vendors that might be of interest to the folks reading this blog. I did not talk to any of the window representatives. I know that the national PHIUS conference had quite a few window vendors that other PH consultants were already investigating them and their information would be better than what I could gather in a short amount of time.

I did see that Second Use was in attendance.  I was eager to talk to  Carrie Ferrence, the Director of Business Development and give them a mention here. If you are not already familiar with Second Use, be sure to check out their website http://seconduse.com/ where you will find an abundance of resources to help you find salvaged building parts you might need or inspire you to a new project with others.  They also have a salvage operation that will remove salvageable resources from buildings.  There is so much use to be made of things we already have and it is great to find people making it as easy for us as Second Use.  Carrie can be reached at carrie@seconduse.com

Another vendor I was pleased to see was Th0mas Van Denend of Shelter Works Ltd.  His website called http://www.faswall.com/ is what caught my eye.  I had heard of this product before, but had never seen it in person.  Faswall is a block building system made of cement bonded wood fiber.  The blocks are lightweight and can be cut with a saw.  Mineral wool or poly-iso foam insulation can be added to the voids before they are filled with cement.  The R values are then R21-R25.5 and Tom said additional insulation could be added to the exterior if necessary to reach Passive House goals.  Mr Van Denend was very passionate about his product, especially the vapor permeability, and longevity of building with this type of building material.  Tom’s email is tomvd@faswall.com

I spoke with some alternative energy vendors while I was at the Home Show.  David Jennings of Rainier Renewable Energy called his business a “One Stop Shopping” for renewable energy and grey water systems.  He had a display of one of their geothermal systems which caught my eye and reminded me of Katrin’s earth tubes and that drew me to his booth.  In addition to Geothermal they also deal with Solar and Wind systems too.   Located in Seattle, his business should be familiar with the challenges that our environment has.  You can check out their website at http://www.rainierenergy.com/ and you can reach David at dave@rainier-energy.com

Another geo-thermal energy vendor I spoke with was John Farlow of Enertech Mfg.  He was quite intrigued with the low heating requirements that Passive Houses have and quickly pulled out his calculator to crunch numbers.  While we did not get into strict details of if his products would be a good fit for any particular Passive House project I found his eagerness to understand what we are doing as Passive House consultants encouraging.  If you are considering geothermal as a component of your project, you can check out Enertech Mfg to see if they might meet your needs.  Their website is http://enertechmfg.com/ You can reach John at jfarlow@enertechmfg.com

The last vendor I talked with before calling it a day was Glenn Maresca of Energy First Services.  They do solar hot water  and radiant heating systems.  Located in Woodinville, they too should be very familiar with our local climate.  Glenn pointed out that they use Sundasolar systems and likes the Onyx line system instead of PEX.  He recommends using radiators instead of infloor heating because there is less water to heat and circulate.  Sizing a hot water and heating system with their flat panel radiators should provide flexibility too.  You can see their website at http://liquidheating.com/index.php or reach Glenn at glenn@liquidheating.com

While none of these vendors were advertising as being specific for Passive House projects, I found each of them someone I might contact in the future if a project needed their product or service.

Don’t forget to register for our upcoming conference where we will have several vendors that will be geared towards PH construction.  Registration is currently $65 until March 12th and then it goes up to $85 until March 21st.  Registration on the day of the conference will be $125.