When the couple Monika and Roman from South Moravia thought about the shape of their future home, they had one thing clear: it should be the home of the future in all respects. When they then found a suitable plot of land, they left nothing to chance. Ms. Monika designed the layout and shape of the house entirely by herself and then made her dream into reality together with the designer.
The resulting building is not only extremely economical, it is also equipped with environmentally friendly materials and can be almost completely controlled remotely. Thanks to modern technologies it is thus possible to control the lighting, play music or even make coffee, even when no one is at home. The couple bought a passive house mainly because they want to save energy in retirement. “We already pay only thirty thousand crowns a year for energy. About five thousand crowns for water and 23 to 25 thousand for electricity,” says Ms. Monika. In the future, the couple plans to buy photovoltaic panels on the roof. which should cut expenses in half.
The basis of a passive house is always high-quality insulation and also its perfect tightness, thanks to which the heat remains inside the house. While in case of insufficient insulation the heat escapes directly through the walls, floor or roof of the house, in case of insufficient airtightness it escapes through a series of small cracks, which in total can mean thousands to tens of thousands of crowns per year, which the owners would pay extra for. “Basically, the point is that the house shell has no unnecessary holes through which heat would escape to the outside. For example, all lights and cable lines must be installed in such a way that they do not create any openings connecting the inside of the house with the outside. Here too we don’t have a fireplace or a fireplace, in short, nothing that connects the house to the outside world “, explains Ms. Monika, who has lived here for four years with her husband.
Whether the house is sufficiently airtight is verified through the so-called Blower Door test. “It consists in the fact that we remove the door in the building, install a fan in its place and overpressure and therefore depression are created in the house. As soon as the difference between the inside and the outside reaches 50 pascals, we measure how many cubic meters d ‘air must be supplied or taken from the house hourly to maintain this pressure difference, ”explains Tomáš Pošta of the Weber division in Saint-Gobain, which focuses on sustainable construction.
A passive house is mainly about insulation
If the house is sufficiently airtight, heat loss and heating costs are significantly reduced. However, this in itself is of course not enough, because the insulation of the building’s outer shell plays a fundamental role. The couple chose the composite webertherm external thermal insulation elastic system for this. “The walls and the ground floor are insulated with 40 centimeters of white expanded polystyrene, while the roof is protected by 42 centimeters of mineral wool”, says Tomáš Truxa of ISOVER, a Saint-Gobain company focused on the production of materials for thermal insulation. At the same time, he adds that a special extruded floor polystyrene with higher compressive strength was used to insulate the floor.
Quality windows, which are sometimes the weak point of houses and apartments, also played their role. “It is always necessary to use triple insulating glass with low heat transfer coefficient. This will ensure that the heat does not escape. At the same time, it is advisable to consider this type of windows, which do not let the heat escape, but which allow it to enter the In this case, in addition, the windows were installed with a pre-set mounting, which minimizes thermal bridges in the window cladding “, explains Michal Široký of the Saint-Gobain Glass company. Thanks to the combination of high-quality windows, insulation and airtightness, the house, equipped with a heat pump, maintains a temperature between 23 and 26 degrees all year round.
Fresh air in any weather
The supply of fresh air to the house is ensured by the air conditioning with an efficient recovery unit, which heats the cold incoming air with the heat of the expelled air. Controlled ventilation and the use of ecological materials are also ideal for the Roman, who struggles with allergies.
Monika and Roman thought of other details during the construction of the house. For example, the house is completely barrier-free and, thanks to the use of plasterboard, a pleasant microclimate is maintained throughout the year. In case of higher humidity in the air, for example during cooking, the plasterboard absorbs part of the humidity and, in case the air starts to dry out too much, releases it inside.
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Both the light and the kitchen can be controlled from anywhere
However, sustainability and comfort are not the only things that make a family the “home of the future”. The whole house is controlled by the Loxone digital system. “From the mobile application, we can control everything that happens in the house, from lights and shadows to cameras and kitchen appliances to the swimming pool,” explains Monika. From anywhere with mobile internet, the couple can bring a visitor home, brew fresh coffee for them, or maybe turn on the music. It is practical, for example, when collecting the mail: with the help of a remote system, they simply open the door for a few seconds to the postman so that he can put the package away and therefore not have to worry about the time when the package will arrive .
The digital system also reacts to bad weather and is connected to a heat pump that provides heating and water heating in the house. The pump was originally designed with a well at a depth of 70 meters, but eventually the well reaches 100 meters deep, which is unique in the Czech Republic. “The sensors are set up so that the floor begins to heat up in the when the temperature inside drops below 23 degrees “, explains Monika. In addition, the system recognizes when there is someone in the house and at that moment starts distributing hot water throughout the house. Thanks to this, it saves the energy necessary for the operation of the circulation pump and at the same time allows you to re-heat the chilled water only when it is needed in the house.
Source: Saint-Gobain
