Meet the First Completed Passive House in NYC
WNYC has an in-depth profile of what went into making 174 Grand Street in Williamsburg the first completed building in the city constructed to energy-efficient Passive House standards. The apartment building has a seven-inch layer of foam insulation that designers from the firm Loadingdock5 determined was necessary by using “special software that starts with climate…
WNYC has an in-depth profile of what went into making 174 Grand Street in Williamsburg the first completed building in the city constructed to energy-efficient Passive House standards. The apartment building has a seven-inch layer of foam insulation that designers from the firm Loadingdock5 determined was necessary by using “special software that starts with climate data from New York City—the temperature highs and lows and humidity levels—[that let] them adjust the insulation and size of the heating unit until they hit the magic mark.” Heating costs for the upper duplex in the building are expected to only run a few hundred dollars for the entire winter due to the airtight technology. The article also quotes architect Ken Levinson as saying rgar Brooklyn has the highest number of Passive House buildings under construction in the entire U.S.; last month we took a look at a Brooklyn Heights brownstone that’s in the process of being renovated to Passive House standards.
A Trend-Setting Building With a Small Carbon Footprint [WNYC]
174 Grand [Loadingdock5]
Images from Loadingdock5.
Everyone stop piling onto Minard. He’s charming and witty, not negative. Can’t you tell the difference?
Coming into this one a bit late but its sort of bizarre that so many people on this blog find this sort of building objectionable. What the heck can possibly bug you about someone building their home to use less fuel and electricity? As others point out this stuff is hardly new or controversial. Here’s an article on Freiberg Germany where a developer built 100 passive homes (back in 2008 probably more now).
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/mar/23/freiburg.germany.greenest.city
There are similar developments elsewhere in Europe, in Vancouver (hardly an extreme environment). A relatively new federal building in San Francisco uses the same approach. Buildings use way too much energy and its pretty easy to fix (except for my in my own home–this thing is a leaky gluttonous monster). Its about time developers in NYC started figuring this stuff out.
11217, I’m astonished that you think I am negative about everything.
That is very disheartening.
The personal insults are really too much form me today. You can disagree with me but I don’t see a reason to insult me, my age, my neighborhood.
Perhaps he and stargazer can start a “why won’t things stay like the 1950s” club.
It’s not your age, Minard. It’s the fact that you are negative about nearly everything new on this blog. How does one live their life thinking everything outside their little Brooklyn Heights bubble is scary and new?
Take a step back and think about why you view everything new so negatively. In the “Time to Talk Gentrification” post you comment that you don’t know any of those names. How about getting to know them then, instead of making such a silly comment. So because you don’t know them, they don’t count or what? Eric is a co-founder of the Brooklyn Flea and has been talked about at length here.
It’s possible to be old, but stay young at heart if you open your mind to new things you know.
tyburg, Insulting someone about their age because you disagree with them about something as insignificant as a new house in Williamsburg is just not nice.
It is also not a good debating strategy.
Minard — don’t be a dink. The aesthetics of this particular house has NOTHING to do with Passivhaus technology. If you recall, AND LINKED ABOVE, this technology is being used in the renovation of a BROWNSTONE in Brooklyn Heights. Hardly a “human thermos.”
Jeesh. Are you really this old and crotchety?
“There are about 25,000 Passive Houses worldwide, with 99.99% of them in Europe (mostly Germany and Austria). ”
Who knew .01% was a trend.
this place looks pretty good in person. it’s a small building, and believe that it will do fine in the market place.