Solar House Building

Status to end 1997 (base line study)

INSTALLED AND COMMISSIONED.

The following fixed features of the solar house are installed for the base line study.

• Passive solar features : insulation, Argon filled low emission coated double glazing, Southerly orientation.
• Air to air heat exchanger,
• Hotile air heating solar roof.
• 98% efficient condensing gas boiler.
• Own water supply from 100 meter deep tube well (this saves paying 60p a cubic meter for mains water, much of which is a charge by the water company for electric power to pumps which move the water 8 miles to the house from Lough Neagh. The water and sewage industries are the single largest customers of the Electricity supply network.)
• On site root zone and fish pond sewage treatment.
• Focal point propane gas fire 75% efficient.
• High Efficiency Lighting
• Single Fuel [propane] used for space heating, water heating and cooking.
• Integration of office and dwelling - use of modern communications systems to reduce travel to work.

INFRASTRUCTURE INSTALLED, EQUIPMENT NOT INSTALLED OR COMMISSIONED PENDING BASELINE ENERGY SURVEY

• Thermomax solar panel
• Auto lights off switches
• Boiler timer controls
• Wood stove in kitchen (also pending chimney improvements) [fitted 1.1.98 - see below]
• 1kW grid connected single phase wind turbine.

FUTURE ENERGY SAVING/HARVESTING DEVICES

• Low energy domestic appliances, propane (very quiet) gas fridge, dishwasher,
• Photo-Voltaic Cells to operate in mains parallel operation.

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LATEST INSTALLATION STATUS AFTER 1997 BASELINE

JANUARY 1ST 1998 - The Jotul Wood stove is successfully installed after implementing many design ideas discussed with the excellent CREST Stoves mailing list in March 1997. The chimney flue has been extended over the height of the roof ridge. The gap between the ceramic pot liner and the concrete block chimney is filled with a dry mixture of micafil, sand and cement for insulation. The flue is capped with a rain guard which turns to face the wind. It all works extremely well and the choking failure of last year's aborted attempt to light the stove with an incorrect chimney design has faded into a memory. The advantages of the Jotul 118 stove are now clear to us. The stove takes logs and scrap wood from the house building debris up to 24" long (600mm). The small door at the front is easy to seal, the burner is easy to keep clean and burns efficiently with little smoke production due to the long flame box arrangement. The fire stays lit for up to 10 hours when run on the lowest air setting. The focus of the house has also moved away from the living room and back into the kitchen. Now the January and February weather can do its worst and we will be as warm as toast with no fossil fuel (propane) consumption for space heating. As we grow our own timber for burning the CO2 production figures will fall. Watch the performance figures over the next few years to determine the exact contribution to the energy and CO2 economy of this unit.

April 1998

We have just completed a thought experiment on appliances for the home . To make and deliver one kWh of electricity to the house requires three or four kWh of fuel to be burned in the power station. If we can use propane directly for some of the electrical appliances then we could save much CO2 from going into the atmosphere. The fridge alone consumes about 10% of the daily average electrical power consumption for the house and the office. If we turned this one appliance from electrical to gas operation , then the waste heat from the gas would heat the house and the fuel cost would actually be £20 less a year - a double bonus. Moreover, these fridges are absolutely silent in operation!

We have added propane powered gas fridges to the Practically Green Lifestyle shop and will be evaluating a unit in the coming months.

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