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Zero Energy Home Report

EDGSN 100 Section 014

Team Number: #7 IDK

Submitted to: Wallace Catanach, April 17

Amanda Schimmoller

aks5588@psu.edu

Nick Suffern

nicksuff88@gmail.com

Mengying Li mfl5156@psu.edu

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Index

a) Executive Summary………………………………………………………………………….3

b) Introduction……………………………………………………………………………………..3

c) Customer Analysis…………………………………………………………………………….4

d) External Research. i) Library/online/patent research……………………………………………………5-7

ii) Benchmarking………………………………………………………………………………..8

iii) Production Dissection……………………………………………………………………8

iv) Global marketplace……………………………………………………………………….9

e) Concept Generation…………………………………………………………………...9-10

f) Concept Selection and Embodiment Design ………………………………….10 g) Energy Calculator ………………………………………………………………………..…11 h) Final Design Description………………………………………………………………….12 i) Conclusions……………………………………………………………………………………..13 j) References ………………………………………………………………………………………13

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Executive Summary:

The need for Zero Energy Homes (ZEHs) has risen and continues to rise as

the availability of our planet’s resources decreases. If every person on our planet

used the same amount of resources as the average American, we would need 4.1

planets to keep our population sustained. The IDK Construction Company has

thusly been given the task of designing a ZEH in the state of Pennsylvania. The

objective of this project is to design a zero net energy house that can

accommodate a four-person family. The house will have two bedrooms and cost a

maximum of $140,000 to build.

Energy saving methods, including using energy that has been produced on

site, were researched and utilized to reduce the energy consumption. The house

is designed in such a way that it produces enough energy in the summer to net

the energy that it consumes during the winter.

There are no risks associated with the design.

The final design is scheduled for presentation on March 4, 2015.

Introduction

The Zero-Energy-Home Project was a design project with the intent of

allowing the groups to creatively make a house with zero net annual energy

consumption based on the limitations of price and those that are outlined in the

customer needs.

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Customer Needs Analysis

Table 1: Customer Needs Analysis

Customer statements Customer needs

Project 1: Design of a Zero Energy Home in Pennsylvania

The home is in Pennsylvania.

The goal is to design a Zero Energy home that meets the needs of a typical family of four

The home meets the needs of a typical family of four.

Made as sustainable as possible using green building principles

The home is made as sustainable as possible using green building principles.

Aesthetically pleasing, i.e. attractive appearance

The home is aesthetically pleasing and has an attractive appearance.

The home not only produces all the energy it needs over a year, but also enough to charge an electric car and still put some excess energy into the grid

The home produces all the energy it needs over a year and enough to charge electric car and grid.

The home demonstrates that solar-powered Zero Energy Homes can be made to work well in the Commonwealth.

The home works well in the Commonwealth.

This is the table of the customer statements and customer needs. According

to the customer needs, we decided the location, size, appearance, sustainability

and other characteristics of our Zero-energy home.

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External Research

i) Library/online/patent research

In the beginning of our project, our group members did some research on the

existing Zero-energy homes that were built in the last several years and are

located in the northeast US. Below are two examples. One of them is called

Greenhill Contract located in New Paltz, New York (1) and the other one is called

The Charlotte Vermont House in Charlotte, Vermont.

Table 2: Research on the existing Zero-energy home

Green Contract (1) The Charlotte Vermont House (2)

Location New Paltz, New York Charlotte, Vermont

House size (square feet) 3200 2970

Number of the floors 2 2

Number of occupants 4 4

Number of bedrooms 4 4

Type of heating system Heat pump Heat pump

Main heating fuel Electricity Electricity

Size of photovoltaic system(kW)

10 7

Solar water heater Yes Yes

R-value of wall insulation R-20 Basement wall: R-21

Above grade wall: R-40

R-value of ceiling insulation

R-20 R-58

Ventilation air heat recovery

Yes Yes

Predicted or measured annual energy use

1733kWh 5999kWh

Other pertinent info Built in summer 2008. Built in 2007

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Over-produced 1490 kWh of electricity.

Annual on-site renewable

generation by wind is

6622kWh

A passive solar design

captures the sun’s energy

first, secondly the earth’s

stabilized temperatures

are tapped for the heating

of the home and hot

water. And finally, a 10kW

wind turbine produces

the additional energy

required. (3)

Green House Contract The Charlotte Vermont House

As we can see in table 2, both of the houses use heat pump as their heating

system and electricity as their main heating fuel. They also apply photovoltaic

system, high R-value of wall insulation and ventilation air heat recovery system in

the houses to generate and store heat effectively.

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From these existing Zero- energy homes, we can conclude that Solar

(photovoltaic) panels, geothermal heating and cooling, super insulation& high-

efficiency windows and heat recovery ventilation are the four major reasons to

achieve net zero energy use.(1)

Geo-Thermal Heating and cooling Solar (photo-voltaic) Panels (4)

Super insulation and high-efficiency windows Heat recovery ventilation

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ii) Benchmarking

iii) Product dissection

The product for this project is the house that we were tasked with

designing. The final product that our group agreed on meets all of the

specifications that were required by the project and the customer needs. These

specifications include a livable four person layout and a zero net annual energy

consumption. This is achieved by having two bedrooms that can comfortably fit

two people in each even if one of them has to have two beds. There is a single

bathroom in the house which, while it may be considered an inconvenience,

makes it easier for the family to be more conscientious about the amount of time

that they spend in the bathroom and how much water they use which contributes

to the house being a more environmentally sustainable system. Other features of

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the house that aid in its net zero energy usage is the insulation, heating system,

and method of doing laundry. The house successfully fulfills all of the

requirements of the assignment.

iv) Global marketplace

The Zero energy home has a remarkable global market. According to the

research carried out by Navigant Research, Zero energy building revenues

worldwide is expected to grow from $629 million annually in 2014 to more than

$1.4 trillion in 2035. (5) Zero energy home gains great support from the

governments, corporations and individuals and its growth is being driven by a

global green building boom, ongoing governmental regulations and regional

environmental concerns. (6) What’s more, with the development of the new

supporting technology, the total cost of the zero energy home can also be

reduced greatly and will become more affordable to the public.

Conception Generation

The concept generation process was driven by the customer needs

spreadsheet along with the group’s own creativity and the limitations dictated by

the budget of 140,000. Our original plan was to have a two story house as they

are often considered to be more comfortable and have a more visually appealing

lay out. We found that this was not likely to work out well due to the cost of the

siding and the windows. With the idea of a single story house in mind we set to

work thinking of the proper exterior dimensions. We decided on a simple

rectangular base so that we could utilize the floor space without having an excess

of expensive materials. After determining the dimensions for the flooring and the

appropriate square footage of windows, we began designing the layout. For this

we went back to the customer needs and decided that a family of four could

comfortably live in a two bedroom one bath house and that became the base

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from which we would work. In the first few designs we attempted to have a more

open layout toward the front of the house but we eventually agreed that this

would be too awkward a layout.

In our final design we used a layout which includes two bedrooms to the

west side of the house and a bathroom next to them, on the north east side of the

house are two multipurpose rooms which could be used as a family room or office

and a dining room, and finally on the south side of the house is the kitchen and

living room which are connected and very open making this space ideal for the

majority of the window area to be located. We wanted this open area with its

large windows to be the on the south side of the house as it would get more light

throughout the year than other parts of the house so that it could be the location

of the heating stone.

Conception Selection and embodiment of design

We worked through the entire process all while continually looking back to

the customer needs and making sure that we were still complying with what we

originally set out to do which was to design an affordable zero energy home for a

four person family. This allowed us to be very certain that our design would work

for all of its requirements and made it easy for us to decide of the best and most

recent design that we had come up with.

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Energy Calculator

Calculator for the price of the house. This chart became a determinant of what

was possible for us to use in our design as it outlines the expenses of the project.

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Final Design Description

The below pictures are two views of the front (north) side of the house and

the back (south) side of the house respectively. As you can see from these

pictures the south facing side of the house, the side that gets the most sunlight

throughout the year, is the side with the largest number of windows to allow for

the radiant heat the a from the sun to warm the house and reduce the heating

costs. Below this window is also where we positioned the heating stone so that

even more heat could be collected and used to heat the house during darker

hours of the day. Within the house there are two bedrooms, one bathroom, two

rooms that could be used as a living room, dining room or office depending on the

needs of the family. The large open space at the back of the house which can be

accessed through the hallway which runs from the front door is where the kitchen

and the family room are located. This final design is simple yet covers all of the

requirements that were asked of us as a design team.

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Conclusion

The house designed by our team has achieved zero energy consumption and

it meets all the requirements of the typical family of four. The total cost of our

house is $140,083, which is affordable for the costumers.

Reference

(1) Greenhill Contracting, Builder of Zero Energy Homes. How we achieve Net

Zero Energy use. http://www.zeronetnow.com/technology/how-we-

achieve-net-zero-energy-use

(Accessed April 6)

(2) U.S. Department of Energy. Zero Energy Buildings: Net zero house-

Charlotte, VT.

http://zeb.buildinggreen.com/overview.cfm?projectid=1019 (Accessed

April 6)

(3) Whole Building Design Guide. Charlotte Vermont House

http://www.wbdg.org/references/cs_ch.php (Accessed April 6)

(4) U.S. Department of Energy. Photovoltaic Solar Cells.

http://carboncycle2.lbl.gov/research/focus-areas/photovoltaic-solar-cells

(Accessed April 6)

(5) "Navigant Research Brings Out 'Zero Energy Buildings' Report."

Entertainment Close - Up (2014)

(6) Hower, M. Global Market for Zero Net Energy Buildings to Reach $240

Million by 2018. Retrieved from

http://www.sustainablebrands.com/news_and_views/cleantech/mike_hower/glo

bal_market_zero_net_energy_buildings_reach_2397_million_2018/ (accessed:

April 8, 2015)