![]() The Saskatchewan Conservation House was so radical that engineers from around the world came to see it. In 1976, when gas prices doubled virtually overnight, a Saskatchewan Research Council engineer named Harold Orr designed and built a pioneering energy-efficient and solar-powered passive house in Saskatoon. Yet Canada was briefly a world leader in passive design. According to the Canada Home Builders Association, there are 456 certified net-zero buildings, and Passivehouse Canada reports 67 certified residential, commercial and institutional buildings in the country. These sorts of buildings are still a rarity in Canada. This decreases the need for additional heating and cooling, and boosts air quality with a constant supply of fresh incoming air and high-level air filtration. Net-zero homes can be built almost anywhere, even in places with brutal winters.Īir-tight and well-insulated, a net-zero home maintains its temperature by recovering heat from the outgoing air to heat the air coming into the house. As the costs of solar photovoltaic systems and heat pumps fall and become more readily available - even IKEA sells solar panels in many countries - highly energy-efficient homes are paying for themselves more quickly.Īnd you don’t need to live in sunny California to have significant savings. The high costs of heating oil and electricity - and growing awareness of climate change and carbon emissions - are drawing people to net-zero homes. Solar energy production costs have fallen the most of any other energy source since 2010, dropping by nearly 82 per cent. Over the past decade, the costs of renewable energy have fallen nearly 69 per cent, a trend powered by strong government schemes around the world. For example, the average monthly energy savings on the net-zero home will be significantly greater than the added monthly mortgage payment cost. And the certification process itself runs about $5,000, but the costs can be recouped through rebates and long-term energy efficiency. (Shutterstock)īuilding high-performance, energy-efficient passive homes costs more - about five to 10 per cent more than a similar-sized home built to code, after incentives. Excess energy may be stored in batteries or sent to the electrical grid. Many net-zero homes use solar photovoltaic panels to produce energy for lighting, heating and cooling systems, hot water and appliances. ![]() Globally, passive house construction has exceeded 30,000 and is increasing as people seek cost benefits, ways to protect the climate and contribute to a healthy living environment.Īs Canada and other countries around the world look for ways to decrease their dependence on fossil fuels and reduce carbon emissions to tackle climate change, the housing and construction industry has been identified as one area that can have an almost immediate impact. It is now the world’s most energy-efficient building standard. “Net-Zero” and “Passive House” are certification labels for ultra-low energy buildings that use very little energy to heat and cool them.Īlthough the origins of the passive house date back to the 1970s, its popularity only began to spread in the past decade or so. Only if you looked at the utilities bill would you know. ![]() Even from the inside, the only visible clues are thick walls and deep windowsills. From the street, you wouldn’t be able to tell a net-zero or passive house from any other recently built home. ![]()
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