New house - what green solution would you do?

[paddler]

We are selling our house and moving to a new village. Not found the house we're in the middle of the process but I'm thinking of doing what I can for the environment with the new house. I wondered what you'd do if you were moving into a new house and expecting to live there at least 10 years.

Make sure it was a Passivhaus? (EPC is a cost, and form, based measure - not good for minimising carbon production.)

PS: I wouldn't put too much faith in any new house built to current regs either...

I read your link then googled ventilation on airtight houses and it seems that they often don't get that right, by not providing correct ventilation. So even if a house isn't properly airtight it can still suffer from a build up of fumes or just stale air.
I think the best way to provide ventilation is with a heat exchanger, but I don't know if many houses have them.

I do know, from my days as a telephone engineer, that just fitting double glazing and then not opening windows causes a lot of condensation, resulting in mould and telephone faults, especially in bedrooms.

Dave

[[XAP]Bob]

You say zoned heating, what is the sensor that controls that? One in each room or is it as simple as turning down the thermostatic valve on each radiator?

Our current house is a 1900 terraced with solid stone front walls. The rear are cavity but I'm not in sure how much space there is for insulation there. Not many houses have cavity insulation if any. What's interesting is the potential benefits the EPC report gave. It's 60 dead on average and at best it can only just go from middle D to only just in C. Our house has studied A+8 or +10 double glazing, the best you could get without triple glazing which there were issues with in our house. AAA rated boiler and radiators we also put in. When I put in the central heating it was a big saving and improvement over economy 7 storage heating. Then the windows meant the radiators rarely got warm. Initially the heating warms the house when we get in and turn it on. Then it's virtually off all night. That's the effect of our windows.

I'm thinking that around here the housing stock isn't great for energy efficiency. There's not many new builds around where we're going. There's possibly a lot better the year they increased the insulation requirements for new builds. A good rating is C with D or E being more common. A lot more photovoltaic cells going up though.

Zoned heating is fairly easy.

There's a central controller that handles the boiler and water zoning then you simply swap the thermostatic valves on the radiators for 'smart' ones.
I used a Honeywell Evohome but there are others out there.

From the controller (or app) you can set schedules per room just like you would for a full house on a normal controller.

Don't you need to alter the pipe work a bit and add mechanical valves for zoning?

Dave

Not normally...

A UK central hearing system normally has a flow and return side of each rad - allowing them to be individually thermostat’ed.
Rarely are radiators wired in series.

The zoning challenge is one of having rooms “call for heat”.

[paddler]

Zoned heating is fairly easy.

There's a central controller that handles the boiler and water zoning then you simply swap the thermostatic valves on the radiators for 'smart' ones.
I used a Honeywell Evohome but there are others out there.

From the controller (or app) you can set schedules per room just like you would for a full house on a normal controller.

Don't you need to alter the pipe work a bit and add mechanical valves for zoning?

Dave

Not normally...


A UK central hearing system normally has a flow and return side of each rad - allowing them to be individually thermostat’ed.
Rarely are radiators wired in series.

The zoning challenge is one of having rooms “call for heat”.

I have thermostatic valves on all my rads, I was thinking more of if the upstairs and downstairs were separate zones. But I suppose there are wireless valves nowadays? Mind you, then there would be the issue of powering them...

Dave

[[XAP]Bob]

Don't you need to alter the pipe work a bit and add mechanical valves for zoning?

Dave

Not normally...


A UK central hearing system normally has a flow and return side of each rad - allowing them to be individually thermostat’ed.
Rarely are radiators wired in series.

The zoning challenge is one of having rooms “call for heat”.

I have thermostatic valves on all my rads, I was thinking more of if the upstairs and downstairs were separate zones. But I suppose there are wireless valves nowadays? Mind you, then there would be the issue of powering them...

Dave

You can have each rad as it’s own zone. My valves are battery powered, last Ok, but not quite long as aid like... the worst thing is that I can’t set the system to email me when the batteries are low on a rad...

[paddler]

Not normally...


A UK central hearing system normally has a flow and return side of each rad - allowing them to be individually thermostat’ed.
Rarely are radiators wired in series.

The zoning challenge is one of having rooms “call for heat”.

I have thermostatic valves on all my rads, I was thinking more of if the upstairs and downstairs were separate zones. But I suppose there are wireless valves nowadays? Mind you, then there would be the issue of powering them...

Dave

You can have each rad as it’s own zone. My valves are battery powered, last Ok, but not quite long as aid like... the worst thing is that I can’t set the system to email me when the batteries are low on a rad...

Oh right, good idea. As for notification, I wouldn't mind betting that someone, somewhere, has sorted it!

Dave

[[XAP]Bob]

The real issue is that it isn’t a *new* house, just new to the OP.

I’d probably do nothing in the first year, just monitor and plan. Then I’d look at what the actual and expected bills where, and where made most economic sense.

OTOH a *new* house I’d be putting in as much electrically “multiplying” devices as I could, as well as batteries and any generation I could. (I.e heat pumps, devices which can output more heat energy than was put into them, a heat pump will never be less than 100% efficient, and will often be over 400% efficient)

Then don’t bother with gas at all,

The one big thing I would do is have a fuel powered stove with a back boiler - whether that be wood pellets, logs, whatever.... or a biomass CHP plant.

Because you want heat in the winter, when most other power options aren’t available.
If you have enough land/drop to make a micro hydro scheme work then great, but micro wind is not likely to be efficient anywhere I would be likely to live - need too much space and height.

[[XAP]Bob]

I have thermostatic valves on all my rads, I was thinking more of if the upstairs and downstairs were separate zones. But I suppose there are wireless valves nowadays? Mind you, then there would be the issue of powering them...

Dave

You can have each rad as it’s own zone. My valves are battery powered, last Ok, but not quite long as aid like... the worst thing is that I can’t set the system to email me when the batteries are low on a rad...

Oh right, good idea. As for notification, I wouldn't mind betting that someone, somewhere, has sorted it!

Dave

If I could be bothered to fiddle with the ridiculous API then I could, just use HTTP and json manufacturers...

[Cyril Haearn]

Traditional building styles are best, thick stone walls or wattle and daub (mud), lots of mass to even out temperature
The NCAT at Pantperthog had a passive house, it had to be modified to stop it storing too much energy and getting too hot

+1 for advice from Bob: wait and monitor
If possible do work oneself

[Tangled Metal]

Traditional houses like my parents old house, 300 or 400 years old. Some walls so thick there's large, Welsh castles with thinner walls. Two windows look more like arrow slots in castles.

One room never seems to change from a fixed temperature of 4°C. However it's mostly cool in summer and cold in winter! It b takes a very long time to warm up if you've been away for a few days in winter. You basically have to keep the heating on all winter. Having mass in the walls doesn't make for a good answer to energy efficiency in this country because cold is more of an issue than heat. You've just got more building mass to heat up to get a warm house.

[francovendee]

Our house is built of stone and stays cool in these hot summers. In winter the house needs a fair amount of heat to get it cosy but once the heat is in the walls it stays warm provided we shut doors and windows and light the wood burner by late afternoon.
There are grants to insulate homes and it's been widely taken up. The downside is that nice old stone houses like ours have external insulation fitted. The resulting in many houses look like holiday cabins.
A friend has a house with heat obtained from pipes laid in the garden which is then processed and heats his floors. Very nice to walk on but it's wrecked some antique furniture handed down from the family.

[Cyril Haearn]

Internal insulation is available too, also internal sound insulation for houses near airports
Fitting it is a lot of trouble and it significantly reduces usable space, can make small rooms unusable

In winter I put on more clothes

[Stradageek]

Slight thread drift coming; to me it seems nothing will change without legislation.

It needs to be mandatory that new houses are all built to Grade A or better and house prices need to be capped to affordable levels. I'm assuming that at Grade A there will be solar panels, heat pumps, sun trapping features etc.

To achieve this either property developers need to take a hit on profit (tragic ) and/or land prices need to reduce (also tragic).

For existing houses fossil fuel burning systems need to be phased out in favour of air or ground source heat pumps powered by electricity from renewable sources. And of course insulation and draught proofing etc. all need to be improved.

Impossible; no it only takes a government not focused on their immediate re-electability and future career prospects. Sweden is a long way down this path and the Dutch cycling infrastructure also shows us what can be done with a government that is brave/principled/far-sighted enough.

I can dream

[halfpenny]

We built new 10 years ago, so this is solid practical advice. Insulation is no.1. Concrete floors up and down for underfloor heating from air source heat pump. Masonry to the wall plate. Whole house ventilation wit heat recovery. Zoned heating. Rainwater for cisterns is a big cost saving, but we abandoned it because it was impossible to stop microscopic organic matter brewing up in the cisterns. Overall we are happy with the 'green' aspect, taking into account all inputs, energy consumption and overall longevity.

[Jdsk]

Lots of comments on energy management above.

How about water management?

... greywater system (not too difficult on a new build, impractical on our renovation)
... catching rainwater
... slowing run-off.

Jonathan

[kwackers]

Lots of comments on energy management above.

How about water management?

... greywater system (not too difficult on a new build, impractical on our renovation)
... catching rainwater
... slowing run-off.

Jonathan

i have several water butts dotted around the garden (two on sheds).
Also have an old 1000 litre tank hidden which is coupled to the main water butt through a buried hose - that lasts all summer even when it's hot and dry.

I did originally think of using the 1000 litre tank for grey water but it would require a pump and header tanks so as a retrofit it's a bit of a no-go unless I can think of a better way.