What Passive Houses Brought in 2012

The last Thursday and Friday of October echoed in the Brno Pavilion A with the voices of speakers, lively discussions among conference participants, all in close proximity to the trade fair for technologies, products, and services for passive houses. Leading experts in the field of passive and energy-efficient construction shared their insights here, and according to the lively discussions, there was indeed much to talk about.

“For each conference, we arrange quality domestic and foreign speakers, and our goal is to engage the audience in discussion. We do not want to present passive and low-energy houses as the only correct solution, but to develop a lively debate on this topic,” adds Jan Bárta, the director of the Passive House Centre.

As emerged from the content of the presentations, the projects showcased, and the subsequent debates, the often-presented argument that passive houses restrict architecture is not true. In the words of Josef Smola: “Designing energy-efficient buildings requires skill. If compromises are necessary, one must understand why and what the consequences are.”
For this reason, and in the context of ongoing legislative changes, the Passive House Centre has decided to make information and insights about passive houses accessible through several channels:

• The main ideas and themes of the presentations are, as in previous years of the conference, captured in a proceedings volume. Passive Houses 2012 will be available from November, both in printed edition and online version, which will be freely downloadable.
• In addition to the proceedings, the Passive House Centre's website has recently opened the previously paid database of construction details calculated using PHPP. At this moment, you will find over eighty details for various construction systems of passive houses, with an additional fifty coming soon.
• In cooperation with IEPD, current Czech climate data for the Czech Republic and Slovakia – temperatures and amounts of solar radiation for calculating the energy performance of a building in PHPP – will be published in the coming months.
• From next year, the Passive House Centre will offer new courses, which will be in accordance with the requirements of the new directive on the energy performance of buildings and current regulations.
  

Several contributions to the conference emphasized that theory is not everything; experience is essential. This topic is also part of the project Paths to Experience, which provides this much-needed practical experience to students in construction-related fields at universities and higher vocational schools and sends them for internships in Czech and foreign companies. Students were also welcomed at the Passive Houses conference – they made up a full third of the 330 attendees.

The end of October this year in Brno was dedicated to energy savings, sustainable architecture, and passive houses. If you couldn’t attend the Passive Houses 2012 trade fair and conference, you can find more information on the website www.pasivnidomy.cz or visit the Passive House Days on the weekend of November 9-11, when the doors of passive and low-energy houses throughout Europe open, and their residents invite you to visit.