Case Study

House: Blandford Avenue Passivhaus

Project type: Passivhaus design & Passivhaus Planning Package (PHPP) calculations

Property: pair of 4-storey semi detached new build houses

Size: 362 sqm (2 no. 181 sqm houses)

Location: Oxford

Overview: Caroline & Paul wanted to build a Passivhaus.  They engaged local architect Guy Roberts and applied for planning permission to demolish an existing house and replace it with a pair of Passivhaus semi-detached houses.  The houses have three storeys and with a basement and are orientated towards the south.

The ground floor is a living room and kitchen and the bedrooms are on the upper floors.  The walls are built from Celcon Solar Blocks insulated with 180mm of Kingspan. The basement walls are reinforced concrete insulated with Kingspan Styrozone H350R.  The ground floor slab is 300mm of Foam Glas and the pitched & flat roofs are insulated with 220mm of Kingspan K7.  A high level of airtightness is achieved with taped membranes, taped ply and skimmed plasterboard.  Heating and hot water is provided by two Stiebel Eltron – LWZ 304 ‘compact’ units.  These units also supply fresh air.

There is low energy LEDs throughout and all white goods are very low energy (A++ rated).  The heating demand for each house is 12 kWh / (m2a) and the primary energy demand is 73 kWh / (m2a).  There is a pagoda in the back garden to shade the south facing windows in summer and protect the house from overheating.  The houses were completed in winter 2016.