EcoHomes -should the concept be integrated into mass housing

[ODA]

Is there anyone who believes that the ecohome concept should be integrated into mass housing through planning legislation?


If the BREEM "good" rating became a standard national requirement, written into regional spatial strategies... as is the case in the south east (UK)... would this lead to mass housing which…looked the same?

I think the plan makers have caved under pressure from the green lobby, and the BREEAM rating was attached to regional strategies as a last resort. I believe in the merits of environmentally conscious design but I think this is the wrong way to go.

Just how valuable is the BREEAM "very good" rating? In my opinion the premise behind the ecohome concept is the reduction of co2 emissions.
The UK targets for reducing co2 in the built environment could be achieved alternatively through the provision of CHP neighborhood CHP stations, as apposed to the national grid.

Just how valuable I the ecohome concept?

I'm far from an expert on this, and I would appreciate any comments.

Many Thanks,

Declan

[johnc]

Declan,

I beleive that all housing should be built to the best possible environmental standards both to reduce CO2 levels and use sustainable / reclaimed materials. Any media that forces profit hungry developers down this route is fine by me.

It may be worth looking at the Association of Environmentally Conscious Builders web site www.aecb.net they have some good comments to make about Ecohomes and other standards culminating in their own Gold Standard.

I like your idea of community CHP but in my opinion technology and cost poses a barrier for main stream intro at present. Also with CHP I have found that in summer when the heat is not required the CHP is burning to create electricity and skying the heat which reduces its overall efficiency.

Incorporation of renewable energy is now quite cheap. We are working on a scheme at present that is carbon neutral and fossil energy independent and the extra cost is less than £22k without taking in to consideration of the £8k grant funding available.

There are also some 'architectural' vertical axis wind turbines available which can be easily incorporated into urban housing projects see. www.windside.com opening up a fresh field of design options.

I am open to all suggestions and comments on this subject.

Reagrds
John

[P.C.]

If we need to rethink the architectural issues Im't not sure that will provide.
Rethinking the brick shuld be easy enough ,determine if putting a lump of wet clay into a stove and what that tiny bit of Lego thinking just cost , proberly what could othervise deliver 10 kilo of high value Epoxy , just to burn a building part.

Now bricks made plenty bad houses, I don't know english contry houses that well, but even here in Dk. lots of people suffered, from lousy building materials, some of called Ecologic, many of these brick houses was a living hell of heat expenses and yet , you don't realise how much new materials ,materials where the cost of a brick as today, would be square meters of building core payed, with the same expense of a single stone.

To build cheap and develob new materials, skills and develobment there are no way around Kill the Brick. If you realy want those hippie ideals encountered there are no way around Kill the brick start build with new Edo materials you, yourself develobed. Today Bricks can be replaced with N.C. cut building frames, forming healthy buildings at a dime, none atleast a third the nowbeing cost, with real 3D advances, Kill the Brick.

[Architorture]

PC- i think you are being too shortsighted in your analysis of the Brick...

granted there is a large amount of energy put into the brick at its creation compared to the size of the brick itself... but also remember that there are still bricks in homes in Rome that were fired over 2 thousand years ago...

now divide that energy investment in a brick over hundreds or thousands of years... hardly wasteful... also a brick as opposed to some high tech building materials is never ever going to off gas something deadly, burn and release something deadly or someday be found to cause cancer...

also bricks can be salvaged and used over and over again due to their regular shape and size...and even if they are crushed and remade into brick again it only requires more energy without any loss of quality of material...once again, not many high tech materials can make that same claim

[P.C.]

"granted there is a large amount of energy put into the brick at its creation compared to the size of the brick itself... but also remember that there are still bricks in homes in Rome that were fired over 2 thousand years ago..."

Yes, but this is also part of my arguments, --- today after 2000 years our emagination are so tight up, in those Lego technikes ,there are a long way before we even start achive ,just some of the promised gains doing it digital ,architects still percept things the same way.

"now divide that energy investment in a brick over hundreds or thousands of years... hardly wasteful... "

No good lazy jobs, that's alright ; but why not "waste it on somthing with a bit more visions, than what can be crafted and cast.

"also a brick as opposed to some high tech building materials is never ever going to off gas something deadly, burn and release something deadly or someday be found to cause cancer... Eh I never realy understood this thing about CO2 . isn't it the gas in my soda, don't I breath out CO2 isn't CO2 the quickest gas to form an harmless acid ?

"also bricks can be salvaged and used over and over again due to their regular shape and size...and even if they are crushed and remade into brick again it only requires more energy without any loss of quality of material...once again, not many high tech materials can make that same claim"

We don't disagrea on that -- reuse are obvious with such highly costfull building compoments -- but realy ,what if the same energy was vasted on a structural adabtor or twelve cubic meters, of highly energy recourcefull building mass, somthing offering a house at a third the cost, four times stronger, and with new develobed Eco sheet works ?

Kill the Brick.

[Architorture]

why would you ever need a house with walls 4 times strong than brick?

also remember that brick construction is done with human energy... not a crane or heavy equipment...

i imagine that if you follow the paths of a brick or of some exotic space age material all the way from the start to all the way to their death, from raw materials and the processes needed to get those materials to construction to the eventual disposal of the materials they probably end up using a negligibly different amount of energy...

[P.C.]

" why would you ever need a house with walls 4 times strong than brick?"

Becaurse build stronger and cheaper with less weight, there are room for more insulation or a smart insulation system.
Why Walls when a lightweight super strong frame assembly , from the cheapest thinkable material, can provide a stronger, more longlived, cheaper to repair, rebuild maintain , add bigger house.

"also remember that brick construction is done with human energy... not a crane or heavy equipment..."

Now I would say that was the perfect argument trying to change it ,try make bricks cheaper atleast so more houses can be build . I think the Ecovise have great oppotunities for develobment and delivery, with modern digital building technikes --- a rough 3D-H would provide the basic building core for centuries ; if "anything" break or wear up in a 3D-H structure, it is not 45 various materials profiles or gutters ,timbers, H steel or U steel beams that ask individual replacement, it is just one material that shape it all, you can cut lumps out of a building, and have prepared new framework ,in progressed style.

"i imagine that if you follow the paths of a brick or of some exotic space age material all the way from the start to all the way to their death, from raw materials and the processes needed to get those materials to construction to the eventual disposal of the materials they probably end up using a negligibly different amount of energy... "

New houses are better in all way's -- when build these problems reduce drasticly.

[Architorture]

maybe i'm not following you right... but if my gutter breaks i'm going to replace that section of gutter...i don't want to have to replace an entire section or panel or extrusion of the whole structure...

[P.C.]

No ofcaurse not, but if what hold them will last four times longer ,maby they will last longer , often it is what hold them that must be replaced and then the gutters go aswell --- but why compare when it is impossible to compare ,there are hundreds of various building technikes and what is wrong with one, can not talk against another technike, that don't even share the same gutters ; who say the gutters whatever those are, are made simular in your house as in a 3D-H structure ?
Remember dusins of beams, timbers, bricks, panels are replaced with somthing quite else in 3D-H. Maby the broken gutters would never break in 3D-H as they would not xist in 3D-H.

[P.C.]

Or to say it in another way -- what if the cost to repair the dameage of rotten gutters would allow you to replace gutters _and_ quater your house ,replaced with new building, would that be bad ?

[P.C.]

Listen I know I am "up" against a crowd of exelent craftsmen, good architects, clever engineers --- they alway's told innovators that nothing can compeed with their high standard -- and true, I proberly can not compeed with crafts that evolved for centuries and extreemly good profesionals.

That is what innovation alway's had to fight, that just to poke and grin that they don't even realise the potential in digital production even for fun, harden that rigid backwerts striving.

No innovative hippie shal say he is better ,That is in fact the real hurdle -- while no one even care calculate if 3D-H realy are that much better, na just a few arts cfitics and future are bold nomatter how frightening.

[P.C.]

Also I am sure your house are much better in your mind, than any 3D-H would ever be --- even it would last 400 years and have the looks of a FLW and be longlived as a stone castle, your house are better .

For you.

But maby a house the size of yours at a third the cost and so strong you could float it and restore it at a fifth the useal cost ; maby the basic steel structure would survive any flood and be rebuildable with gutters, would that be so bad for anyone else.

[Kevin]

Okay, now getting back to origin of the thread, the value of the BREAM "very good" rating, and the utility of an EcoHome concept in mass housing...

I think it is essential that eco homes characteristics penetrate the mass housing market as much and as quickly as poosible. Will BREAM-certification help in the UK market? I'm sure others could say better...

[Architorture]

they should concentrate on 'good design' and many of these environmental factors should fall into place... instead i would fear that housing will be built that only fulfills a checklist and may only hold to the principles of sustainable design for the initial commissioning and not have the depth to really make a great living environment...

i could easily see some sustainability issues in design ending the same way modernism did when it was used to create affordable mass housing developments... don't forget pruit igo

[P.C.]

Listen, what is needed is a new way to build the same at a third the cost. Same or better strength , new technikes that build a better house, technikes that accept engineered materials , why must a hey ball be square ?

You don't know how deep you are in it.