Web Events

Passivhaus Principles Applied to Refurbishment in the Social Housing & Community Sectors:

Below are four videos covering the application of Passivhaus principles, in part or whole, to the following property types:  tower blocks; a mid-terrace, solid walled building, and a concrete-framed community building.

The first two of the tower block projects are examples of how adding external insulation and upgrading fenestration can be carried out on high rise buildings. Whilst these projects can achieve significantly improved levels of performance through improving key elements of the building fabric, they were not originally conceived as whole building refurbishments to the Passivhaus new build standard (nor to the recently launched Passivhaus refurbishment standard ‘EnerPHit’).

The final tower block project presented and the final two projects, however, are all examples of a whole building approach, concentrating on application of the following key Passivhaus principles: application of continuous insulation & minimisation of thermal bridging; design and installation of a continuous air barrier to minimise heat loss through uncontrolled draughts; replacement of existing windows with new high performance triple glazed windows (U-value of < or = 0/8 W/m2K); installation of whole house / building heat recovery and ventilation.

The following links provide additional information about topics discussed in the videos. You may also wish to browse the Retrofit for the Future projects (and others) at www.retrofitforthefuture.org.

• The Passvihaus Standard
• The Passivhaus EnerPHit Standard for Refurbishments
• The Pass Net project

These films were made for the AECB by SplashTV

Once you have had an opportunity to view the videos, you canfollow this link to the AECB forum and join the discussion there.