PH Plus and Premium: wrapping in more than Renewables?

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Bronwyn Barry

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Apr 13, 2015, 6:20:23 PM4/13/15
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I've about to leave for Leipzig to learn more about the new Passive House certification levels: Plus and Premium.  These include new calculations for Primary Energy that appear to be wrapping much more than simply renewable energy sources into the calculus of Passive House.  Here's a great article that provides a good introduction: http://passipedia.org/certification/passive_house_categories/classic-plus-premium?s[]=primary&s[]=energy&s[]=renewables.

This is all very new and exciting and I'm still wrapping my head around this shift.  The big new inclusion is obviously credits for renewable energy sources.  These have all been assigned  'factors' that account for their seasonal availability and storage capacity (eg. biofuel has a higher 'storage' capacity than PV since wood pellets can be burned 'where the sun don't shine.')  However, what I'm most intrigued by, based on my early understanding, is that it looks like this new PER calculation also directly incentivizes water efficiency - something we in California critically need to focus on.  As the above Passipedia article explains, buildings that typically require large amounts of hot water will need to carefully address water use via reduction in order to meet these new efficiency classes.  (The various manufacturers of drain waste heat recovery systems will be pleased to see they're included, along with a big boost for Heat Pumps.)  It also looks like the PER calculation does a much better job of calculating real energy use offsets for winter consumption, where many 'fudge' the calculations by relying on grid connection for summer generation 'storage' that doesn't account for primary energy use during winter peak loads.

Now that I'm getting to understand these new Plus and Premium Passive House standards, I like how they encourage water saving and provide a more equitable way to account for renewable energy inputs. In the meanwhile, I've been reading loads of interesting discussions all directly and tangentially related to this topic.  Here are links to a few articles:

The Demise of Utilities as We Know Them: http://www.greenbiz.com/article/utilities-are-you-ready-solar-plus-storage-going-take-over-says-rmi-solarcity

Battery Storage- The Numbers Don't Add Up - Yet: http://reneweconomy.com.au/2013/battery-storage-the-numbers-dont-add-up-yet-97438  (see the two additional follow up articles that are linked in the top of this one.)

Storage is the New Solar: http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/featured/Storage-Is-the-New-Solar-Will-Batteries-and-PV-Create-an-Unstoppable-Hybri 

I'll be curious to hear other's thoughts on this subject? Will Tesla's new battery factory shift the whole market enough to change the PV-battery-grid tie debate?  More relevant to planners, designers and architects, will the new American 'great room' now be filled with batteries?  

The future is so infinitely interesting.... 

Bronwyn

PS. A number of us attending Leipzig will be happy to share our experiences and information in an attempt to offset our flight carbon.  If you're on Twitter, I'll be live-tweeting as much of the event as possible.  My twitter-feed is @passivehousebb.  Alternatively, tune in to @naphn_info for additional updates, of follow the hashtag #iphc19. Shed loads of fun! 

 

Dylan Lamar

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Apr 14, 2015, 1:04:04 PM4/14/15
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I share your enthusiasm Bronwyn. I've been at PHI Germany for the past week at the Certifiers training and have learned quite a bit about the new PER (Primary Energy - Renewable) standard. I'm feeling as giddy now as I did when I first learned about Passivhaus!

Here are a few of my key takeaways thus far:
- They've continued to uphold the rigor of a "conservation first" performance standard... you can still certify to PH "Classic" without any renewables.
- Whether you have renewables on-site or not, the PE calc is now replaced by the PER calc: this is based upon a future energy grid fully supplied by renewables.
- Most importantly (especially pertinent for "Net Zero" Standards in the US): it recognizes that renewable energy has limited availability (both day/night and seasonally).
- Thus PER factors are essentially a "source-to-site" ratio as they were before except now they are based not on fossil-fuels, but on renewable energy delivered either A) Directly, B) through Short-term Day/Night storage, or C) through Long term Seasonal storage. (Short term storage has about 20% losses and Long term about 70%).
-Biomass is also no longer just a "freebie" but is limited based on resource availability.
-PER calculations differ by energy end-use and by climate: for example heating is needed in winter, when there may be low solar availability, whereas cooling is opposite.
- This PER standard works for all building types in all locations (not just those that can manage to make themselves "net zero")... so it works for hospitals and it works for north-facing sites for example.
- For those that want to go further than Passivhaus Classic, renewable energy which is built by the building effort (doesn't have to be on-site, but has to be newly built) then a RE factor is calculated with benchmarks for PH Plus and PH Premium. Increased PER benchmarks are also required.

What I'm most encouraged by is for the first time a building performance standard is addressing the fact that renewable resources have limited availability, and the Passivhaus Institute with its team of 70 German Physicists is setting up an incentive structure to guide us toward buildings that will be resilient for a renewably supplied energy grid. At the end of the day this is the issue which the highly popular "net zero" standards are completely missing.

Looking forward to seeing ya'll in Leipzig.

Prost!
Dylan

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