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2003 8-
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500
450
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400
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390
350
300
250
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2011 PHIUS /- /-

.

1.

Being biased towards conservation by constraining the envelope design through

definition of annual heating and cooling demands and peak loads per climate that must be met
using passive measures first. The climate-specific annual demand thresholds should pay back the
investment and peak load thresholds should assure comfort.

2.

Meeting a total primary energy maximum per person for all energy uses in a building.
This is essentially the equivalent to a carbon limit, responding very directly to the amount of
carbon savings that need to be achieved in the building sector to stabilize the climate.

3.

An airtightness requirement assuring building envelope durability, verified by climate

and measured in air leakage per square foot of envelope area.

4.

Cost-effectiveness using national average costs for materials and energy.

The sweet spot or characteristic energy use intensity (EUI) is then defined as the optimum design
between demand and supply, or more specifically, between conservation and generation.
Lower PV prices have changed the conversation
In a sustainable world we must look at zero energy as our goal. We are no longer only trying to
justify the cost-effectiveness of a certain level of stand-alone conservation, we are trying to
justify the optimal combination of both, conservation and generation, to reach zero energy.
The energy supply would be expected to come from renewable sources; for buildings this would
most likely come from photovoltaic (PV) systems. The cost for these systems has come down
dramatically over the past few years. This changes the conversation significantly. Figuring that
zero is our goal, the cost of PV has a significant impact on where the optimum lies. Now zero has
indeed realistically become our new target; positive energy is next. That alone is reason to redo
the calculations and refine the standards.
In 2013 we pitched the idea of refining the standard depending on climate and cost to Building
Science Corporation in Westford, Massachusetts. They liked the idea and submitted a research
proposal with PHIUS as an industry partner under their DOE Building America contract to
define passive standards by climate zone according to U.S. cost data. The calculations are being
done using the energy modeling tool WUFI Passive (developed by the Fraunhofer Institute for
Building Physics, Owens Corning, and PHIUS) and the energy and cost optimizer BEopt
(developed by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory).

A one-hundred-year payback period is unrealistic

The effort is running calculations for all climates for a typical single-family home, with carefully
chosen and defined design constraints and energy baseline features, first in BEopt. All baseline
decisions were carefully conceived and evaluated by the PHIUS tech committee. In the process,
it became clear that the European case for cost effectiveness of the 15 kWh/myear standard is
based on a 100-year lifecycle period for a single-family end townhouse.
The tech committee found this to be an unrealistic value for a North American economic
feasibility assessment of conservation measures. One hundred years might be accurate in an
ultimately sustainable energy economy, but we are not there yet. The measures need to be costeffective in the old economy as we are transitioning to the new. Consequently, the tech
committee opted to use 30 years instead of 100.
The committee also settled on using a detached, average size single-family home the
predominant housing type in North America. The detached home is also arguably a worst-case
scenario to use as a benchmark; any other building type, larger or attached, will perform better.
European internal load assumptions dont work for North America
In reviewing base assumptions for the model, the tech committee also decided that the internal
loads currently assumed in the European model are far from realistic. While the committee
agreed that the defaults for internal loads should be stringent compared to the current national
average use of miscellaneous electrical loads, they also acknowledged that the current European
defaults are only one-seventh of the actual current internal load average in the United States.
This leads to a significant mismatch of what is assumed and what happens in reality.
Corrected higher initial internal loads in turn impact heating and cooling demand criteria on an
annual basis, and have an impact on where those demand criteria need to be defined when setting
standards.
As of this writing, the standard adaptation test plan is almost complete and the parameters and
the methodology for the study have been decided. As the project progresses, the dynamic
modeling side of WUFI Passive will be used to verify hygrothermal wall assembly performance
by climate and to assure that the comfort criteria by zone are maintained when annual heating or
cooling demands are slightly increased or reduced.

Preliminary results are looking very promising. PHIUS is already accepting projects under a pilot
certification program.
As the work has moved forward, questions have arisen as to how granular these new standards
should be. The final format is still an open question. Originally, a zone-based standard model
was envisioned, but it is also possible that the study will result in the development of an equation
that accurately calculates the respective heating, cooling demand and peak loads by location.
The new climate specific standards findings are scheduled to be presented for the first time
during the Ninth Annual North American Passive House Conference in San Francisco,
September 12-13, 2014.
* Because of the limitations in PHPP discovered in the field, PHIUS partnered in 2011 with
Fraunhofer Institute for Building Physics and Owens Corning to collaborate on a new passive
design tool that would appropriately predict energy performance for passive buildings in all
climates. We now use WUFI Passive, capable of static (similar to PHPP) as well as a more
detailed dynamic simulation to assess whole building energy performance, comfort conditions,
hygrothermal performances of envelope assemblies, and hygric interaction of the enclosure and
the living space.
Katrin Klingenberg is the co-founder and executive director of the Passive House Institute U.S.
(PHIUS). She has spoken and published on passive building topics nationally and
internationally, holds a masters degree in architecture, and is a licensed architect in Germany.
-

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