Flatrock Passive House: A Passive House in Newfoundland

Summer was off to a bad start.  June was cold with an average temperature of around 7C accompanied by a lot of cloud cover and drizzle.  I have realized over the past 10 years that outdoor living spaces in Newfoundland are really limited.  Our summers are short and you really don't have a whole lot of time to use it.  For this reason, I planned on using the outdoor space quite differently than my previous property.  I also wanted to make sure that my time in the garden had some payback.  Given the state of our food security issues I decided that a good place to invest my time and effor would be creating a landscape that has some food security.  As well, I wanted a low maintenance landscape that grows well in our environment, and is resilient to drought and pests. My plan for landscaping was quite simple really:  Go back 50 years and do what most Newfoundland families did. They grew root vegetables. Good cold climate varieties that are tuned to our short growing season are easily

May can be a beautiful month.  This year it was cold but the weather has been sunny and somewhat dry.  The windchill typically makes it pretty cold so dressing for exterior work means putting some effort into layering!  Most of the work that I had to do was on the south side of the house so as long as the sun was shining and I was wearing dark clothing, I actually felt warm. I have many projects scheduled for the summer so getting a head start was a necessity.  My first project was adding the shade structure to several windows on the main level.  The WUFI model showed some overheating in the middle of summer without the structure in place.  Before we installed the clapboard siding, I attached vertical ledgers (I call it a vertical ledger board) so I could secure braces that would be used to attach the shade structure.  I deviated from the designers plans a little.  The planned structure would have involved scaffolding and several sets of hands to install.  It seemed like I could make

During the past year I have spent a major portion of my life dedicated to the implementation of details that would ultimately lead to perpetually lower energy bills.  I am confident based on our final blower door test (0.36 ACH50) and thermal imaging (to be presented in a later blog) that we have achieved the efficiency that I was aiming for.  This being said, a house has to be more than just a set of plans and bunch of numbers on paper.    It needs to be liveable.  It should be a space that you enjoy and become part of as you grow. My father and I spent two months (ie February-March) working on various interior projects in order to complete the interior of the house.  We had lots of ideas and details that we wanted to achieve.  We decided early on in the project that we wanted a modern traditional look so most finishes were chosen based on that premise. The one project I am ecstatic about is the staircase!  It was my first time building one and it turned out great! The dining room

The ERV (Venmar X24ERVE) has been installed for some time now.   It was installed in February to help with some of the moisture load associated with the drywall and plaster.   Three dehumidifiers weren't able to keep up with the moisture load so Adam (Hot Water and Fresh Air Systems) installed the ERV and we turned it on to help with the drying process.  Initially the system ran unbalanced but with the house under some depressurization so we both agreed that it was fine given that it was heating season. Just before we moved in, we balanced the ERV.  The balancing the procedure for the X24ERV is fairly simple and all electronic.  The procedure is carried out using the x24 wall control.  First, the tubes of the differential manometer are connected to the ERV pressure ports.  The manometer provides a differential pressure reading in inches H2O.  The CFM is then determined from a data table included with the machine which represents stale air fan curve.  You can then adjust the fan s

Before getting into most of the particulars about the hydronic system and the Walltherm commissioning I figured that I should discuss a little about my choices of radiators.   There were none available locally.  Hydronic radiators are a specialty item so had to be ordered in regardless of brand name.  Jaga makes low temperature radiators.  They have a large surface area and provide high BTU at low temperatures.  Some of them have ECM fans to boost output.  The price was beyond the scope of my build so I abandoned that idea fairly early after I decided that I wanted to use hydronic heating.  My HVAC contractor (Adam Rickert, Hot Water Systems), recommended Softline radiators by Stelrad ( http://www.expressradiant.ca/compact-series ).  They are a low volume radiator and the manufacturer provides BTU output for low water temperatures.  The BTU output from the radiators was determined from load calculations provided by Passive Design Solutions.  Moving water around at lower temperatures l

The Walltherm is the centre showcase of the Flatrock Passive House heating system.  As mentioned in previous posts, it is a gasification boiler.  With a efficiency of 93% (LHV), it dumps about 12.5 kW into hot water while only 2.5 kW is emitted to the room (specifications with the Quick Insulation kit installed.).  It took 4 of us to move it with a hand truck into the living room (Photo 1).  With the wall thimble already in place (Photo 1) it there was only one place for it to go.  However, limitations in the lengths of double wall stove pipe made the placement a little challenging. This being said Excel ULTRABlack   manufactured by ICC (Purchased locally from Emberly Fireplace ) comes in a variety of different lengths, and they also have slip lengths to accommodate many set ups so we placed the stove so that the back was 10" to the wall (minimum offset to combustible according to the manufacturer).  Excel ultra black lengths were chosen so that the setup would work.  Photo 4 show

Attic hatches are notoriously leaky and are often under insulated.  The challenge here was to build a hatch with deep insulation (i.e. at least R-36) and has great air sealing details.  Luckily my plans came with details to build a hatch to meet the specifications. You may recall that in a previous post ( https://flatrockpassivehouse.blogspot.ca/2017/08/the-attic-hatchway-landing-and-catwalk.html ) I illustrated that because of the depth of insulation in the attic, the hatchway had to be built with deep sides much like that of a deep window buck.  Trying to push the hatch door straight upwards would just lead to the door binding so the back end of the hatchway was sloped to make getting into the attic and moving the hatchway door easier.   To plan the build I had to think a little about how the hatch would tie into the air tight barrier.  Initially, when the OSB on the ceiling was installed, 3M and acoustical sealant was used around the perimeter of the hatchway buck.  This mad