serendipityoucity

When I went to Architectural Technology school in the 80s, CMHC and if I recall correctly NRC were conducting studies on solar energy, CMHC in particular explored passive solar energy.  The programs were scrapped shortly thereafter much to our chagrin then and now. We had a great methods and materials prof who introduced this batch of college kids to passive solar energy and I recall happily drawing the blue prints with my Koh-I-Nor 2h drafting pencils on Mylar and digging through the CHMC library on Montreal Rd. for standards and specifications.

Later, in Japan, I met passive and active solar enthusiasts and carpenters who were refurbishing old farm house thatch roof’s with solar panels and constructing off grid homes.  I was also exposed to the Whole Earth Catalogues.  I loved going through the hardware catalogues, looking at how-to sketches, visualizing projects and dreaming of cities taking this on as a way to demonstrate conservation leadership.  25 years later the conversation is still going but we have not made major breakthroughs as the incentive is not high enough!

Yesterday, I was having lunch with my friend Tina after digging up some garden beds and a whole for her new tree named the ‘Tracey Burning Bush’!  We were talking about her friend Malcom’s house constructed in such a way that it will not require any heating this winter.  We are supposed to go and see it soon!  Then today I come across a 3 page article in the Globe exactly about that issue. David Braden has built a house that

is so airtight and insulated it needs next to no heating. The house is so efficient, he claims, that it "doesn’t make any sense" to spend $4,000 on a furnace. So he didn’t. He hasn’t bothered to connect to the grid either, and meets electricity needs with a wind turbine and solar panels in his side yard.

Apparently, there is a trend called 

net-zero houses [which] occasionally draw power from the grid, they are able to get by most of the time using only photovoltaic panels or backyard wind turbines. When it’s windy or especially sunny they pump what is surplus to the home’s needs back onto the lines, offsetting the energy used from natural gas and balancing out power needs to zero.

There is also something called the green building continuum, a Net-Zero Energy Home Coalition (NZEH) and a CMHC EQuilibrium program which is a national housing initiative that selected Twelve homebuilding teams to build EQuilibrium demonstration projects across Canada. In 2008, these projects will be open for public tours.  The NZEH Coalition works with CMHC, NRCan, Industry Can and house builders.  It is

incorporated, multi-stakeholder organization comprised of Canadian champions in advanced energy efficient residential construction and building products, the utility sector, research and development and, manufacturing and deployment of onsite renewable energy technologies. The objective of the Coalition is to advance the benefits of the more efficient use of zero or very low impact resources including cleaner air and healthier homes, climate protection and, economic development opportunities resulting from the expanded manufacturing and deployment of energy efficient technologies and appliances and onsite renewable energy generation in Canada’s residential marketplace.

This coalition is aiming to build 40 000 net zero houses by 2018.  I have never really considered house ownership as an option for me, but I could see myself some day trading some life energy toward accumulating resources to build one of these houses.  It would be great to have a few clustered in a hip Canadian city.  Maybe even a coop that would combine permaculture design principles and using a pattern language and an innovative social structure to keep it going might be very cool indeed. Maybe even a village in a city! I like individual homes, but I have really enjoyed living in Coops and the community that comes with them and I can’t see why we can’t think of these projects at a large demonstration scale. I think living in a Coop is democracy in action as the social structure is about collective management of homes and community.  It is not always fun and easy, but I think it is a great way to raise a family and live together.

The Conservation Coop in Ottawa is one example albeit their social system took a hit when the Coop got downloaded to the city and they had to turn 50% of their units into Rent Geared to Income which meant that they lost control over membership and subsequently the principles of conservation living.  Just like a society is not sustainable when 50% of its population is below the poverty line, it is near impossible for a small housing coop to be successful.  Mixed incomes is what makes a coop successful and so far 30% RGI is the max to ensure smooth leadership and long term management of the coop. 

All that to say, that once I am done this PHD thing I might be able to dedicate sometime to this sort of project, and until then I can meet some people, do some side learning and maybe learn about financing.  This combines a bunch of my passions:

• social housing
  
• public input into infrastructure
• environmentally sound design
• architecture
• knowledge transmission
  
• extrasomatic memory built into the structures (physical and organizational) that is communicated across time
  
• information ecologies
• ways to live together
• building stuff
• building for the long term
• traipsing around construction sites just like when I was a kid
• wearing steel toed boots & working with construction workers
• shopping for tons of interesting stuff
• community building
• designing human urban habitats
  
• and the love of reading how-to manuals!