If we as a society are to achieve the sorts of reductions in greenhouse gas emissions that climate scientists tell us are needed to prevent catastrophic climate change, we . . . need to tackle our existing building stock, including houses. – Alex Wilson, Environmental Building News.
New homes are complex structures, systems that function on the interaction of hundreds of components, constantly seeking to degrade, constantly struggling to keep out the elements and shelter and protect the occupants. A new home, however, starts with a “clean slate”. What goes into it and how it is assembled can be carefully planned in advance. It is usually designed with a “typical” occupant in mind. But compared to existing homes, new homes are the proverbial “piece of cake”.
The 126 million existing homes in this country cover a vast spectrum of ages, designs, locations, materials, maintenance rigors, and, perhaps most important of all, occupants. If we are to have a serious impact on reducing the energy load of housing in the U.S., we must address the issues of existing housing. We have the technologies to reduce the loads of homes by 70% to 90%. We have the knowledge of how that can be done, although it is not simple to do. If such dramatic weatherization is performed incorrectly, it can destroy the building. Tight, energy efficient structures are not always forgiving. The Starting From Home Challenge is an exciting intercollegiate and interdisciplinary competition that encourages the development of building science programs to propagate existing, state of the art knowledge and seek to expand the knowledge base.
Homes last for hundreds of years, occupied by dozens of occupants. Although the fundamentals of building science remain true, new technologies and new realities are posing new, unresolved questions. And like all the technologies of our age, the pace of change is accelerating. As described by Linda Wigington of Affordable Comfort, Inc., home construction has been based on three premises that were thought to be enduring:
v Predictable energy and water cost and supplies;
v Predictable weather events and climate stability;
v Value neutral energy consumption, treating it as a commodity with no moral consequences to consumption.
To address these issues effectively we need strong, inventive minds that can creatively reach conclusions based in solid fundamentals but with new connections to address the new realities.
The Starting From Home Challenge reaches beyond the technologies of building science. The house and the occupants in it are a system. When we drive a car, we constantly interact with the car and its environment. We know the speed from the speedometer. We know our fuel consumption from the gas gauge. We have stickers on the windshield to tell us when to change the oil and when to have the car inspected. Before homeowners habits change they must be made aware of what is happening in their homes – how much water they are using, how much oil or gas, how much electricity. Only when they are aware will their habits change.
Principals and Goals
The 11 individual Challenges are based on three fundamental principals and goals:
- Reduction of the energy loads of existing homes. On the narrowest scale, significantly reducing the energy loads of the homes involved in the Challenge is the essential bottom line.
- Education of the participants and the homeowners. To keep the homes operating properly, the occupants need to understand and appreciate the systems nature of the structures they live in. That understanding will spread to their friends and neighbors. The students involved will learn and question and challenge the program and its fundamentals to grow and develop. Their knowledge and their discoveries will spread beyond the Challenge for years to come.
- Promotion of the concepts. To widen the impact of the Challenge and have the greatest impact on our national energy independence and our long term impact on the planet, the concepts engendered by this effort need to be promoted beyond the boundaries of the Challenge and its participants.
The Starting From Home Challenge will test proficiency in a wide range of skills. It is a team event, in which the diversity of abilities comes from the composition of the team rather than a single individual. Engineering students will work with students from other disciplines such as sociology, psychology, marketing, communications, graphic design, analysis, and computer science to do the troubleshooting, communicating, dreaming, and building this challenging project requires. The first Starting From Home Challenge will take place over the course of 2008 and be judged at the Affordable Comfort Conference in Kansas City in April, 2009.
Priorities
The following set of priorities determines what the 11 Challenges should encompass.
v Energy Efficiency: Improving the energy efficiency of the home and reducing the carbon footprint are key ingredients to the success of the Challenge and its legacy effects. The Challenge will measure the starting and ending points of energy consumption of the home and use those numbers to establish the carbon savings. How much added energy would be required to bring the home to the magic Zero Energy number and what approaches could be taken to get there?
v Consumer Communications: Serious energy reductions in homes can only be achieved if the occupant participates and concurs with the changes. They need to understand and integrate the changes in their homes into their lives. They need to know what is happening through feedback. And they need to be able to communicate their enthusiasm to others.
v Comfort: There are technical metrics that can predict a home’s comfort such as temperature and humidity and indoor air and environmental quality (including sound). There are also less quantifiable comfort issues such as the occupants’ reflections on comfort for their lifestyles and comfort with their home’s economics and maintenance costs.
v Appliances and Electronics: We are ever more dependent upon our electronics to ease our daily chores and expand our horizons. Devices are designed to stand-by waiting for our commands, adding to the home’s “plug loads”. Some of this originated from vacuum tube based entertainment equipment. Keeping the filaments warm for instant on became a feature. The SFHC will seek to have the teams address these parasitic loads.
v Water: Water is a precious resource that we use without thinking. The SFHC will be challenging the teams to address the household water consumption without striking negative comfort issues with the occupants. Washing the dishes once a week or bathing once a month might not be the most acceptable solution!
v Hot Water: A great deal of energy is consumed delivering hot water to sinks and showers in the home and techniques have been developed to address that energy waste. The SFHC will look for creative approaches to solving these problems in these retrofit applications.
v Getting it done: Teams will be asked to document the energy required to “get the job done”. If materials are ripped out of the home, energy is required to haul the waste away and treat it.
v Life Cycle: Quick problem resolutions can serve as “band-aids” that only address the symptoms and don’t come close to addressing the cause. The SFHC will be considering every decision the teams make from a Life Cycle position. A motor may be inefficient, but if it is in the living space does that offset the cost of heating the space? In all seasons? The inefficient motor may or may not last longer than an efficient one. It may require more or less maintenance cost. The SFHC will expect the teams to present clear rationales for their decisions.
v Project Documentation: The Challenges will be performed locally. All of the information received by the judges will be received through project documentation. The clearer and more precise the documentation, the better the case will be for the success of the team’s work. There are industry standard approaches to many of the problems that the teams will face. But this is a developing field and taking an innovative approach is encouraged, but it will be up to the team to prove that their approach is better than and at least as accurate as an industry standard approach.
