
Bilyeu Homes of Oregon has just completed a Passivhaus that the average consumer would actually buy. Read the homeowner's blog to learn about the construction process. Jetson Green has a full overview.
This blog will examine the insights of traditional architecture (particularly long-standing relationships of home construction to regional variations in geography and climate) in order to build desirable, energy-efficient homes for the future American market.
"Traditional courtyard homes developed between 3,000 or 2,000 BC "incorporate a variety of appropriately designed inward-looking habitable rooms and spaces at different floor levels around a planted courtyard to suit different seasons and to enhance privacy," according to an exhibit at the Science Museum of London that shows a model of one such house in Baghdad. These "naturally conditioned homes" are still found in many places, from Beijing to southeast Turkey, and likely beyond..."
"Wieland believes the market downshift reflects 'a fundamental change in the way people are going to want to live,' and not just a reaction to scarce credit and insecure jobs, said F. David Durham, senior vice president. 'We're not waiting for things to return to the way they were.'"
"'The traditional houses have many environmental advantages,' said Abdulla Zaid Ayssa, the director of the government office that oversees all building and renovation in the Old City.
"The traditional plaster, joss, does not erode stones over time the way cement does, Mr. Ayssa said, and is more durable. Qadad, a stone-based insulation material used in roofs and bathrooms, is much stronger than modern equivalents. The old stones and insulation techniques are calibrated to the sharp temperature shifts of night and day in Sana’s desert climate, so that the sun’s warmth fully penetrates a house’s walls only at day’s end, and is then retained through the night and no longer, Mr. Ayssa said. They are also much more soundproof and private than concrete.
"'They experimented for hundreds of years to find these techniques,' Mr. Ayssa said. 'By comparison, nowadays we are building houses with a very stupid concept.”'"