Passive House
We are one of the leading Passive House builders in munster achieving high standards of performance.
Passive House Construction
We are a leading Passive House builder in Cork, many companies talk about Passive but when you dig deeper you will discover a lack of understanding about the reality of what is involved in achieving such a high standard of performance criteria.
At Ecotech Homes we are only one of a handful of companies in the country who have completed a number of houses to the Passive Specification both as Certified Passive and to the Passive Standard i.e. comparable performance levels without the certification.
Your plans or ours: Full build of your own house plans from concept stage to obtaining full planning permission, or choose from one of our own house designs/plans available.
A Passive House is a dwelling in which a year-round comfortable interior climate and good indoor environmental conditions can be maintained without the use of significant active space heating or cooling systems.
The concept of a Passive House is based on minimising heat losses and maximising heat gains, typically this includes optimising insulation levels with minimal thermal bridges, high thermal performance windows, very low air-leakage through the building, utilisation of passive solar, internal gains and good indoor air quality maintained by a mechanical ventilation system with highly efficient heat recovery.
By creating a thermally efficient building envelope and making optimum use of free heat gains the space heating requirements of a Passive House are minimised, thus reducing but not eliminating the need for a conventional heating system; the air supply system essentially serves to distribute the remaining heat requirement.
The creation of a Thermal Building Envelope with very low air-leakage (air-tight) and the provision of a mechanical ventilation system (HRV) is key to ensuring the required volume of fresh air needed for healthy living conditions is provided.
As a Passive House is more demanding than a conventional Irish house in regard to conception, for Passive Certified Houses design and execution of construction work, a quality approval process for checking and verification purposes must be maintained for performance and certification.
Passive Standard or Near Passive Homes are built to the same levels of performance and efficiencies, using the same demanding specification, giving you all the efficiencies without the final certification.
The main certification criteria, applicable to residential Passive House buildings, are described as follows:
Specific Space Heat Demand max. 15 kWh/(m2a)
Pressurization Test Result n50 max. 0,6 h-1
Entire Specific Primary Energy Demand max. 120 kWh/(m2a) incl. domestic electricity.
Useful cooling Demand (if applicable) max. 15 kWh/(m2a)
The above criteria for the Passive House is non-exhaustive and are explained further in detail, for Passive Certified Houses these must be verified in the Passive House Planning Package (PHPP), by Passive House Institute, Germany.
Turnkey Passive Solutions
A product of Ecotech Homes is Passive Plus Homes where we offer a full turnkey service for building your home, that is all aspects of the building from the structural requirements, energy efficiency and performance specification, implementation, complete construction of the house and completion of such items as joinery, stairs, kitchens, fireplaces, stoves, tiling and wooden flooring, all undertaken by us, so on completion all you need do is turn the key in the door and move in to your new home.
Contact Us
Tell us about your project ideas or just say hello. Whether you’ve got a big idea or need some inspiration with a building project, we are here to create perfect buildings. From concept to creation, let us inspire you.
Contact Us: +353 (0)21 4630659 | kevin@ecotechomes.ie
