This snippet is from one of our previous episodes: Healthy Houses: Is This The New Way For Property Investors?

With rising energy costs, growing climate concerns, and an increasing demand for healthy, sustainable living environments, there’s a growing buzz around passive homes — but what are they exactly?

In this TPC Gold bonus episode, Bryce sits down with Raphael Siket (passive house owner and director of a building biology service) and Amelia Lee (founder of Undercover Architect) to explore why more Australians are choosing to build these innovative, high-performance homes.

Key principles of passive house design include double or triple-glazed windows and capturing the sun’s heat where it counts. But it’s not just about efficiency… it’s about creating a home that feels good to live in.

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If You Enjoyed TPC Gold | What Is a Passive House—and Why More Aussies Are Building Them, You Might Also Like:

Transcript

Bryce Holdaway
So for those people who don’t know what a passive home is… what is it?

Raphael Siket
So in terms of a passive house, I think a lot of people say that passive means that you don’t have to put any energy into the house; no gas, no heating, no anything. And the sun does it all in the orientation and the materials and so on. But you’ve got to put in some energy. There’s a certain figure and a number, which I don’t know what that is, but it’s very low. Therefore, regarded as passive. And it just makes so much sense to me that the orientation is such that you get a lot of natural sunlight and warmth, and the insulation is enormous so that you are maintaining that temperature that comes in. You make the best of all the heating and all because it depends on your environment.

But I just think it makes so much sense because it goes hand-in-hand with a healthy building, except if you don’t ventilate properly. And this does seem to be a big problem with so-called very high energy star rated houses or even sometimes passive. Passive houses are big on ventilation. But there are some where it hasn’t been in the past and then a mould explosion occurs because all this moisture we talk about is now so well insulated in the house, but it needs to constantly ventilate. So heat recovery ventilation systems are a big part of passive houses, which means that the air is being exchanged all of the time. So all your wet areas: kitchen, bathroom, laundry, the air is being exhausted 24 /7 and air from outside is coming in, filtered and is fresh air. But that heat you don’t lose from the house. It is a heat exchanger, and it transfers that heat to the incoming cooler air. And in summer it bypasses that and so on. So it’s better, but the air is controlled.

It’s quiet because everything like in ours is triple glazed. And something that’s unusual, it’s not spruced as passive house, is that there’s no creepy crawlies. Because they wrapped the house, the roof and everything… we turned around and went, before we had cockroaches, we had spiders, we had silver moths, you get all the usual pests, rats, mice. And since we have this passive house, we don’t have any pests. We’re like: where have the daddy long legs gone? Like we didn’t mind them, but where have they gone? And they scurry in when you open the door. That’s the only way they make it in. The rest of the time, everything’s completely sealed. So you don’t have to use any pesticides like a lot of people use. So it just makes sense that it’s comfortable, it’s quiet, it’s good air quality, and it’s well insulated and uses very little to heat and cool.

Bryce Holdaway
Amelia, what’s your experience with passive homes and how would you describe it?

Amelia Lee
Yeah, I think one of the things that I know, since sharing more about passive house with the Undercover Architect community… I’ve seen a really high level of interest in it. And one of the big things about passive house is that you need to use a passive house certified tradesperson or builder to build the home, and the amount of modeling that happens during the design phase that then is checked up as part of the construction. So they use a PHPP modeling tool, which basically tests and measures how the design is going to work in terms of energy savings and energy use so that they can get that equilibrium between those two things in the insulation and the passive solar design and the heat recovery system and those types of things. They take into account the amount of heat and energy that we as humans are producing, in terms of cooking our meals, in occupying the house. So all of that gets factored into the modeling tool.

And then during construction, the passive house certified tradesperson or builder has to basically do a bunch of checks and measures to demonstrate that the house is being built as per that modeling. Now that’s something that is currently missing from standard residential construction. And so there’s a lot of people who see that passive house is actually a way that they can get certainty that they’re actually getting the house that they designed built in the finished product.

One of the things to be aware of about housing generally in Australia is that on average it measures at about 1.5 stars energy rating. Now our base level for an energy star requirement in this country is 6 stars. That’s still a base; it’s a very low base. It hasn’t changed for over 10 years. We’re hoping, keeping our fingers crossed that there’s gonna be a change to 7 stars in the National Construction Code for 2022. But it’s a very sort of poor performance and most houses are at 1.5 stars energy rating.

With passive house, you’re seeing greater energy efficiency and you’re also seeing greater control of your indoor air environment. A lot of homeowners think that: Well, am I ever gonna be able to open a window? Am I gonna be feeling like I’m living in a box or vacuum that’s just airtight? And I think when people actually go to experience what it’s like to be in a passive house, they realize that they’re actually getting to control the quality of their indoor air environment.

Now we’re spending over 90% of our time in indoor environments. Large part of that more than ever before is in our homes. And yet we’re living in environments that the indoor air quality is absolutely terrible. And I think that the stats in terms of passive house, they measure the air changes per hour. So you have to, as part of building the passive house, you get lower door tests… where they seal up the house and they pump air in at a particular volume and rate. And that then measures the amount of leakage that’s happening from the home’s envelope. And the builder has to achieve 0.6 air changes per hour or less in order for it to be certified. So they do that before the lining goes on the inside of the house, so that they can make sure that all of the exterior is sealed the way that it needs to be. So then the mechanical and heat recovery ventilation systems can be the things controlling the air change.

Now an average house in Australia has anywhere between 15 air changes per hour and 49 air changes per hour. And that’s just happening through the cracks around our windows, through the cracks in floorboards, skirting boards. It’s air coming in and out that we can’t control because of the leaky way in which our buildings are constructed. And with that air change is coming vapor and moisture and toxins and things that we can’t control as well. So the passive house does offer an alternative to being able to create a much more controlled indoor air environment and a much more comfortable one as well.

Bryce Holdaway
Which is how I would describe your house, Raph, having been in there. It is a unique environment and experience to be in that passive space. Now, because I’m the least qualified in this conversation to talk about it, I’ve gone to Google prior to this conversation. It appears that there’s five basic principles, and you two will let me know if I’ve missed any or if I’m wrong. But number one is solar orientation. Number two is high insulation.

Three is high performance windows. And you talked about triple glazing before, Raph. Number four is an airtight enclosure. And number five is balanced ventilation and heat recovery. So essentially what we’re trying to do is create an environment that’s airtight that is using natural elements to try and heat and cool… so that we can A) save on cost and B) increase the experience we have in the house. And probably the third one we didn’t think about Raph, is to make sure there’s no daddy long legs in the house.

Raphael Siket
Exactly.