Question:
Does anyone out there own one of the Enertia Building System passive solar houses? We’re looking in to possibly building one in central New Jersey, and we’re wondering how good they really work at keeping the house warm in the winter and cool in the summer. Also just any comments on how much people like to live in these houses in general. Also any problems they had in building it, etc.
Response:
> Does anyone out there own one of the Enertia Building System passive solar > houses? > We’re looking in to possibly building one in central New Jersey, and we’re > wondering how good they really work at keeping the house warm in the winter > and cool in the summer. Also just any comments on how much people like to > live in these houses in general. Also any problems they had in building it, > etc.
Kirk; Just took a look at some Enertia pages, and bookmarked it. The theory sounds excellent, and I can vouch for the "enertia" of solid wood. I built a solid log cabin on a lake in Ontario, no insulation in the ordinary sense in the walls. Once that place gets warmed up, it holds heat all night, no hopping up to rebuild the fire. (Roughly 27 degrees F last weekend.) In the summer, we open windows at night, close ‘em in the morning… and in an 85 degree F day, it’s like walking into a cool cave. I might examine how the Enertia system would adapt to logs… Cheers, Nelson
Response:
Would this be a version of the envelope house type promoted by Ecosea in the 80s? R. Gary Boyd of Charleston designed one which still stands, although the present owner is uninterested in the passive solar aspects of the house. TB – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – > IIRC it’s an envelope type system. double wall system with air gap between. > have built similar type system, concept works. > — > Steve Spence > Subscribe to the Renewable Energy Newsletter: > http://www.webconx.com/subscribe.htm > Renewable Energy Pages – http://www.webconx.com > Palm Pilot Pages – http://www.webconx.com/palm > X10 Home Automation – http://www.webconx.com/x10 > (212) 894-3704 x3154 – voicemail/fax > We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors, > we borrow it from our children. > — > Does anyone out there own one of the Enertia Building System passive solar > houses? > We’re looking in to possibly building one in central New Jersey, and we’re > wondering how good they really work at keeping the house warm in the > winter > and cool in the summer. Also just any comments on how much people like to > live in these houses in general. Also any problems they had in building > it, > etc.
Response:
IIRC it’s an envelope type system. double wall system with air gap between. have built similar type system, concept works. — Steve Spence Subscribe to the Renewable Energy Newsletter: http://www.webconx.com/subscribe.htm Renewable Energy Pages – http://www.webconx.com Palm Pilot Pages – http://www.webconx.com/palm X10 Home Automation – http://www.webconx.com/x10 (212) 894-3704 x3154 – voicemail/fax We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children. — – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text -> Does anyone out there own one of the Enertia Building System passive solar > houses? > We’re looking in to possibly building one in central New Jersey, and we’re > wondering how good they really work at keeping the house warm in the winter > and cool in the summer. Also just any comments on how much people like to > live in these houses in general. Also any problems they had in building it, > etc.
Response:
>IIRC it’s an envelope type system. double wall system with air gap between. >have built similar type system, concept works.
No. Bad news, especially with no insulation. It only works when the outdoor temp is more than 70 F during the day and less at night… Nick Article: 4143 of alt.energy.renewable Newsgroups: alt.energy.renewable Organization: Villanova University >> >…Hundreds of articles have appeared in newspapers, books and magazines >> >from October 78 to April 1981… >…you are practically calling mr butler a liar… >If the claims hold water…then we’ll talk.
There are two articles in Rodale’s New Shelter magazine, of September, 1980, which says "Hard data on double-shell homes" on the cover. The first article is "Double Shell Houses," subtitled "Finally, some facts," on pp 72-82, in which Larry Stains says: A promotional brochure for Ekose’a, a San Francisco firm that sells double shell house plans, says its homes "prove it is practical to design and build a structure which maintains any desired range of temperatures through any range of climatic conditions at any place on the earth [above the arctic circle in wintertime, with no sun at all for 6 months? --Nick] without the necessity of mechanical, electrical or fossil fuel back-up systems." That’s a mighty big claim… Last winter, two double shell houses were monitored by researchers. Their findings indicate: 1) The houses _did_ depend on auxiliary heat; thus the design is not a guarantee of energy self-sufficiency. 2) No way does the earth underneath the house store the majority of the solar heat collected in the greenhouse. Don’t misunderstand. Double shell houses are good houses that use a fraction of the energy consumed by conventional designs. But the double shell design should be understood for what it is, not for what it is cracked up to be. So, for the facts, let’s examine two homes… A detailed record of temperatures in the Burns house from mid-October to early February was compiled… then studied by three Boston-area solar engineers… The monitoring equipment consisted of temperature sensors at some 30 points throughout the house, and a data logger to keep track of it all. The findings are revealing. For one thing, temperatures in the living room sometimes fluctuated from the mid 70s on a sunny afternoon to the mid 50s by dawn, when it was 0 F outside… Another double shell given close scrutiny last winter was Robert and Elizabeth Mastin’s house in Middletown, Rhode Island… Last January the house was monitored for 12 days by scientists from Brookhaven National Laboratory. To find out how much heat the house required to stay warm, the scientists installed three 1500-watt heaters in the house, one on each floor. They were controlled by a thermostat which the Mastins were requested to keep at 65 F. Daily records tabulated the electricity used by the heaters. In addition, sensors kept round-the-clock track of household temperatures. Let’s look at one of the 12 monitored days: January 18. It was overcast; the outside temperatures ranged from 30 F, at 12:01 a. m. to 41 F at 2 p. m., and back down to 37 F by midnight. The Brookhaven equipment showed that the average "inner house" temperature stayed between 62 and 65 F. It also showed that the three heaters were tapped for 193,707 Btus of back-up heat that day. That’s the same as burning two gallons of oil. On a fairly mild winter’s day, no less. The figures for the Burns and Mastin houses help to settle part of the controversy about double shell homes. But details need to be hammered out… Everyone has his pet theory, and one double shell aficionado in California actually talks of "holism" and "loopiness" when explaining the design. [Gee, I wonder who that was...] There is a side-box that describes complete working drawings for a series of double shell houses, sold by Tom Smith and his partner, John Hofacre, for less than $100. The sidebox also says: Ekose’a sells blueprints for $500, a semi-custom design service for $4,000, and a full custom design service for 15% of construction costs. In order to get plans, you must purchase their $25 book. The second article is an interview with the same Tom Smith, "The Double Shell: An owner’s Perspective," beginning on page 82. He says, inter alia: Avoiding confusion about the "envelope" requires only a little deprogramming from the Higher Order of Convective Loopers. The solar function of the house is only part of the story, and _there is no significant storage of excess heat for use during the heat losing times of the day_." [his emphasis] When asked, "What’s the future of the "envelope" system?" (in 1980), he said: I do not forsee any of the systems we now have surviving past the next few years. We have created a bit of a Frankenstein with my house here because it launched the field of envelope homes and is seen in competition with other systems. Nothing could have been further from my intentions… I would feel most proud if my house is remembered for being a step in the evolution toward mass energy-efficient design, rather than for introducing the "most efficient system." [Curious how Tom Smith says "my house," not "Lee's house."] After working on, literally, hundreds of passive designs, and living in this house over the past three years, I am convinced that energy efficiency will become considerably less exotic in the future. It is my belief that if we just study closely what is going on inside a house, we’ll come up with some very simple, if prosaic, solutions. If you have ever spent any time living in other parts of the world you’d realize that a lot of our energy problems stem from just plain doing it wrong. It’s a snap to save energy in this country. As soon as more people become involved in the basic math of heat transfer and get a gut-level, as well as intellectual, grasp on how a house works, solution after solution will appear. Amen. Nick
Response:
Seems the Romans were already using this system …. well before JC ! Must be more effiscient now with new materials and new products to replace the air ! Again .. the Ancient were more in advance than moderns ! http://pierrebonnard.online.fr/index.htm A part of MORVAN in France for sabots, handicrafts and wood works Where to find informations and help on Generic Cadd, Visual Cadd Steve Spence a
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