The school is perfect, in its imperfection. But at the end of the process they had turned a liability into an asset and changed its environmental profile. They worked on one building component at a time, over years. They bypassed architects and general contractors. By combining their expertise and keeping it simple and stealth, the team was able to make a huge impact on the community and significantly turn the school around for a very modest amount of money. It isn’t perfect, it isn’t glamorous, it isn’t award winning, it isn’t for the magazines, but that was just the point. they did the best they could, with what they had. They did the best they could, with what they had. Marc reviewed the new details with us, pointing out where the thermal bridges remained, and where the details were improved, but they were far from perfect. It is important to realize that this project represents the work of highly skilled and experienced professionals, who were able to target issues with a laser focus. They used a blower door and a smoke machine to ferret out the myriad of existing problems. He was able to do the necessary calculations that were warranted in the work. It was not a gut renovation and it didn’t rise to the level of any certification. It didn’t happen all at once, but happened over years in the summers while the students were on break. They were able, step by step, to radically alter the performance of the building, give it a new look, and recover the asset for the school all with a reasonable budget. The workforce was small, independent, one and two man outfits cobbled together from the community of carpenters and handymen. Without a fat architectural drawing set available, only detailed and relevant sketches from their informal team were handed directly to their workforce. With a very modest budget, and armed with powerful insight and knowledge, they were able to identify the essential steps that needed to be accomplished. Marc and several other community members with construction expertise gave their time to turn this project around. The Plainfield School was the most important asset in a community that was not a poor community but was far from affluent. There were 20-degree swings in temperature within the building, the envelope was failing, and the mechanical systems were at the end of their useful lives. The original school was very poorly designed, complete with thermal bridges, moisture-and-mold-promoting wall assemblies, and overly complex and ineffective mechanical systems. His talk was about a project – the Plainfield School in Plainfield, NH – in a community where Marc had lived. I believe that the conference organizers place some of the rock stars in the last sessions to keep the attendees from leaving too early. The conference keynotes given by Zack Semke and Jeremy Rifkin described the dire circumstance that we find ourselves in, but refocused us away from our fear, and back to the knowledge that we still possess the ability to turn this situation around with viable pathways forward.īut the highlight of the conference for me came in a presentation by Marc Rosenbaum in the last time slot of the conference. We need to reduce energy use in all of our actions, including the specification of materials. We are realizing that saving embodied energy in materials is every bit as important as saving operational energy in buildings, but we are just now grappling with how to introduce this piece of knowledge into the work. It is clear that the embodied energy of materials is the next frontier, the next shiny thing to learn about. It is clear that we as a community are feeling pretty confident that we have started to conquer understanding how to create energy efficient buildings and many of us are looking for what comes next. We have all drunk the Passive House Kool-Aid being together is validating and recharges us to go out and spread the word some more. The experience refocuses us and encourages us to go back into the trenches and try harder. Being together with like-minded people is cathartic. Many of us go there to recharge and be energized by a conference full of enthusiasts, who, like us, are anxious to raise the bar, even if it is only in the tiny slice of our sphere of influence. This conference has a great group of people who are all pioneers or early adopters of Passive House in their fields, and who are bound together by that common vision. The PHIUS conference was, as always, packed with a host of fascinating insights. I spent the end of last week in Washington DC at the PHIUS conference. Renovating Existing Building Stock - Remember KISS (Keep It Simple, Stupid!)
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