WHAT’S IT LIKE BUILDING PASSIVE HOUSES?

It's no secret that we have shifted our business to building only high-performance homes or Passive House projects. It's a decision we made nearly two years ago, jumping into it head first (probably a little too quickly), but one that we do not regret for one second.

Initially, our decision was met with some hesitation from those around us. But when we explained our reasoning, those who questioned the move became our greatest supporters. Now to sit back and tell you it was easy would be a lie; it wasn't and is still a work in progress. Behind those pretty Instagram photos, there has been countless hours of frustration, hard work, and stress endured to develop the final product. It's also still a work in progress. But if it were easy, everyone would be doing it. The quote, "the idea is free, but the grind is expensive," has never felt so true.

However, all of this is offset by how rewarding the work has been. To say I have never loved my job more is an understatement. I have found a niche that I love working with and have met some great people along the way.

Now, let's go back to the start. About three years ago, I did the Passive House course; it had been something I always wanted to do since I was an apprentice. Doing the course blew my mind on what we are doing in the construction industry and it instantly changed my thoughts on building and where I wanted to take my business.

Anyone currently in the industry, whether you're an architect, designer, engineer, energy rater or tradesperson, should find time to do the course. Your brain will explode, making you question your purpose in the industry.

But I had to find these Passive House projects. Where the fuck am I going to start? It seemed like an almost impossible mountain to climb. To me, the biggest hurdle was finding designers who would design a Passive House or try to convince someone to take a leap of faith. Luckily for me, James from Altereco Design had also just completed the course, so we were kind of in the same boat. I was able to start bouncing the ideas in my forever-thinking brain off him. Long story short, I landed my first Passive House project in the strangest of circumstances, where we talked our Forrest Street clients into building one. I still have no idea how this really came about, but it all just happened. And then, suddenly, I had two other clients wanting to build Passive Houses. I had gone from not knowing where to start to having three in the preconstruction phase and beginning construction in the next six months. Some part of me feels like it was luck, but you create your own luck!

Let's now skip to the part where we start building these things…

Constructing Passive Houses requires a ton of communication, from the design and preconstruction phase right through to the construction phase.

Early on, we spend so much time running numbers, investigating pricing for certain aspects to dive the cost of the build down and doing everything possible to get the project out of the ground. I had never gone into a build before where I knew so much about the home I was about to start building, as I have for our three Passive House Projects. I was aware of most of the issues we were going to face, how we were going to get this home airtight, where our HRV ducts were going to run, how we would deal with the foundations, and how I was going to approach my trades in doing things "differently". I have gone on about it before, but my trades have been fantastic; they have adapted, learnt and embraced what we have been trying to achieve.

This process hasn't been without its challenges. Whilst an Instagram post may look nice and pretty, it's far from the reality of what happens onsite. I can't tell you how many "ah fuck" moments we have had.

One of my biggest concerns was keeping water out of the subfloor at our Forrest Passive House, which created some chaos. What we thought would work, didn't work as well as we wanted it to. It was 90% there, but that wasn't good enough. We were finding some water was getting through the chipboard, so we had to spend some time making sure it could drain out rather than soak into the insulation. Luckily our insulation stayed dry this whole time.

Whilst most of our trades have adapted, not all have. That was tough to deal with - especially when you give someone a brief, be told they will carry it out and then not carry out the task as per the instruction and try hide it. When questioned about what had been done, little to no care was shown and quickly the team jumped back into the reality of "but this is always how we have done it".

The most stressful part though was the air tightness. When you care about something so much, the pressure it brings can be stressful. It wasn't hard to get the home airtight; it's just the complete unknown when you have never built a Passive House or achieved .60ACH before. You have no reference point, what to look for or any idea what the result will be. To add to the stress, I forgot my first blower door test was the same time my clients had their fortnightly onsite meeting. A hot tip for any builder doing their first blower door test, maybe don't make that mistake! Luckily for us, our clients are so damn awesome, and we passed with flying colours. That Sullivan's Cove whiskey that night had never tasted so good good!

There's also working with SIPS for the first time. That has been so exciting and a space that is rapidly growing. These big ice cream sandwiches, manufactured halfway around the world, fit together seamlessly. Working on a tight site has made things challenging - communicating with neighbours to get a crane into a position where we can lift panels, but we made it work.

And we have learnt so much.

Like a lot.

You can only read up on so much and think you know it well until you do it. You then realise that what is on paper sometimes does not work. Those countless hours of watching YouTube, reading journal articles and case studies then putting what you learnt into practice makes you smile after a long day.

So would we do it again? Hell yes!

I thought I was proud of my previous projects, but this has taken things to a new level. Knowing that the homes we build are much more comfortable and healthy gives me great satisfaction. My partner and I are currently designing our home to be a Passive House with Altereco Design, and I am so excited to live in one once we can get through the painful experience local councils put you through in the planning stage - I'm sick of spending a fortune on antihistamines.

However, as a builder, we can't build these homes if you don't demand them as clients. Whilst Passive House is the ultimate goal, creating a high-performance home is very close and needs to become the benchmark for our buildings. We try our best to educate everyone on building better in the hope our industry can evolve and be better. Things are looking positive with change on the horizon which is exciting. We have more exciting Passive House and High-Performance projects in our preconstruction phase. We can't wait to get these out of the ground and continue to test and challenge what is possible in the industry.

We will continue to learn more about building science and apply this to our new home. Our learnings from each project are taken to the next so we can improve and get better. To us, there is no other way of designing or building a home unless it's high performance or a Passive House. With people starting to demand higher standards around energy efficiency, Passive House is the only tested and proven method to achieve this!