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Green Building Winter Trainings throughout the Midwest

As part of the Alliance’s mission to educate the builders, architects, developers and the public at larger on the latest in Green Building, we are offering several courses around the Midwest and online this year.  Studying for your Green Associates? LEED AP Home?

DATE/TIME* EVENT TITLE / LOCATION CEUS
Tue, Feb 12, 2013
12:00 PM – 1:00 PM
An Introduction to the Living Building Challenge – Lunch Time Webinar – Free
1.0 AIA /GBCI
Thu, Feb 14, 2013
2:00 PM – 3:30 PM
Subslab ventilation systems for moisture control
Tue, Feb 19, 2013
9:30 AM – 6:00 PM
HOMES 401: Green Rater Training
Priority Energy – Training Center
Park Ridge IL
14.0
Wed, Feb 27, 2013
12:00 PM – 1:00 PM
A Homeowner’s Tale, Passive House & LEED Home Case Study – Free Webinar
1 GBCI / 1 AIA
Thu, Feb 28, 2013
2:00 PM – 3:30 PM
Implementation of successful daylighting control systems
Wed, Mar 6, 2013
7:00 AM – 3:45 PM
Better Buildings: Better Business Conference
Kalahari Conference Center
Wisconsin Dells, WI 
IACET | AIA | NARI | RESNET | USGBC/GBCI | WI-DSPS | BPI
Wed, Mar 6, 2013
5:30 PM – 7:30 PM
Living Building Seminar Pre Conference Networking Event
TBD
Ann Arbor 
1 AIA 1 GBCI
Thu, Mar 7, 2013
9:00 AM – 4:30 PM
Understanding the Living Building Challenge 6 Hour Seminar
Guardian Club Banquet Hall
Detroit Michigan 
6 AIA/GBCI
Mon, Mar 11, 2013
9:30 AM – 6:00 PM
LEED GA: Core Concepts & Strategies – Naperville
Electric Association
Naperville IL
7.0
Wed, Mar 13, 2013
9:30 AM – 6:00 PM
HOMES 252: Understanding LEED for Homes – Wilmette
TBD
Wilmette, IL 
7.0
Tue, Mar 19, 2013
12:00 AM – 12:00 AM
eQUEST energy modeling series
NIU Outreach Center at Naperville
Naperville IL
IACET • AIA • GBCI • ISPE
Tue, Apr 9, 2013
12:00 AM – 12:00 AM
eQUEST energy modeling series
Radisson Paper Valley Hotel
Appleton Wisconsin
IACET • AIA • GBCI • ISPE • WI-DSPS
Wed, Apr 10, 2013
9:00 AM – 4:30 PM
Understanding the Living Building Challenge 6 Hour Seminar
Wisconsin Energy Conservation Corporation (WECC)
Madison Wisconsin
6 AIA/GBCI
Wed, Apr 17, 2013
9:00 AM – 4:30 PM
Understanding the Living Building Challenge 6 Hour Seminar
Wisconsin Energy Conservation Corporation (WECC)
Madison Wisconsin
6 AIA/GBCI

*All times are US Eastern time (EST)

Group rates available on workshops! Contact info@alliancees.org for details.
All programs approved for AIA and GBCI credit. Other CEU programs may also apply.

As a 501(c)3 charitable organization (view our details), we deliver green building education courses through out the Midwest usually at cost. Please support us to help keep these going. Your donation to the Green Home Institute may be tax-deductible. Please check with your accountant or tax attorney for details.

Thank you for your support!

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Wisconsin Passive House owner says drop on by anytime!

“I want as many people to come into this house as possible. Anyone who reads this can knock on my door and I’ll give them a tour. The whole point is to share and learn from each other, to take ideas from here and do them elsewhere.” – Sonya Newenhouse

With Carly Coulson as the certified Passive House designer. This tiny (968-square-foot) kit house has a treated floor area of 888 square feet (82.5 m²). This project sports local windows and Cardinal triple-pane glass, while the doors are Energate. The NewenHouse is wrapped in a jacket of cellulose – and similarly comes in well under the specific space heating demand.

Carly recently presented the project at the Hannover Passivhaus conference. Here are some of the project specs:

  • Space heating demand: 11.4 kWh/m²a (3.61 kBTU/ft²a)
  • Primary energy demand: 104 kWh/m²a (32.9 kBTU/ft²a)
  • Blower door: 0.51 ach50
  • Wall U-factor: 0.09 W/m²K (R-63)
  • Slab U-factor: 0.10 W/m²K (R-57)
  • Roof U-factor: 0.06 W/m²K (R-94)
  • (7,795 HDDs)

The project is also rocking a solar domestic hot water system (Velux) that is expected to provide nearly two-thirds of the domestic hot water needs, and a PV system for site net zero energy.

The project went through BRE in Watford, UK, for Passivhaus certification, is Energy Starcertified, and is expected to hit LEED for Homes Platinum after Landscape verification by the Green Rater Laura Paprocki.

Total cost for NewenHouse – including solar DHW, PV, and accessory structures – is a whopping $173/sf. If there was a LEED Titanium, this über-tiny Passivhaus in an “extreme” environment would surely qualify.

Newenhouse, who aptly describes herself as an eco-entrepreneur, is also founder and president of Community Car LLC in Madison, and just sold the Madison Environmental Group, a business she founded 13 years ago, to an employee. In the next year, she plans to launch a business selling three house designs — a 500-square-foot one-bedroom, an 800-square-foot two-bedroom, and a 1,000-square-foot three-bedroom. An option for a detached stuga, Swedish for “cabin,” includes storage space, a root cellar, sleeping loft, sitting area and wood stove. With her business, Newenhouse says she is trying to bring together three movements: the green building movement, the small house movement and the sustainable- or simple-living movement.

A brief overview of her kit house can be found at http://www.madisonenvironmental.com/documents/NewenHouseHandout_10%2010%2011%20(3).pdf

You can contact Newenhouse at 608-220-8029 or Sonya@madisonenvironmental.com. A link to her blog is on the a at madisonenvironmental.com. Or if you’re planning to drop in, which she says she welcomes, she lives at 422 Hickory St. in Viroqua WI.

Want to learn more about Passive House features & LEED?   is hosting a free webinar of another Homeowner’s journey in Michigan who attempted passive house & is on track for LEED Platinum. Missed it? It will be recorded and a 2 hour video series on it’s construction & post occupancy living will be out by Fall. https://greenhomeinstitute.org/education-and-events/a-journey-to-passive-house-leed-homeowners-tale-free-webinar/

This article is a mash up between Joe Orso of the Lacrosse Tribune and Mike Eliason of Green Building Advisor. Their stories can be found here

http://lacrossetribune.com/news/local/joe-orso-building-for-the-future/article_b4265ffc-709d-11e1-8457-001871e3ce6c.html

http://www.greenbuildingadvisor.com/blogs/dept/guest-blogs/cold-climate-passivhaus-construction-costs?utm_source=email&utm_medium=eletter&utm_term=energy-efficiency&utm_content=20120606-2012-iecc-specs&utm_campaign=green-building-advisor-eletter

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Brings LEED Workshops to Wisconsin

The tide is rising and LEED Homes are now experiencing a tremendous growth rate.  To capitalize on this, is offering several workshops in Wisconsin, including a free introductory webinar:

  • April 4: Free Webinar!  Introduction to LEED for Homes  View Recording
  • April 19:  HOMES 252: Understanding the LEED for Homes Rating System (Milwaukee, WI)
  • May 8: HOMES 252: Understanding the LEED for Homes Rating System (Madison, WI)

Visit the pages above for details and pricing. Early bird pricing is available so Register Now!

LEED for Homes Postcard

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Racine LEED home shows Modern Minimalism is Green

certified another LEED Platinum home in Wisconsin that features a picture-perfect location on Lake Michigan’s west shore in Racine, Wisconsin. The Scekic-Osborne home is a three-bedroom, 1900 square foot home — an example of the recent trend of home sizes retreating to more reasonable levels rather than the McMansions of yesteryear. The home, designed by Johnsen Schmaling Architects of Milwaukee, mixes modern architecture with a growing design trend known as “micro architecture,” which places a premium on petiteness, design and sustainability.

Download Scekic-Osborne Residence Profile

The home’s modern exterior features exposed steel beams and concrete walls, with expanses of glass offering views through the home to Lake Michigan. Large glazing areas necessitate efficient windows (.29 U-value) as a critical component to the home’s energy performance. The windows give expansive views, but are also a source of energy loss. To make up for this, the home’s design eliminated windows on the north wall and included a number of energy-efficiency strategies to keep the home comfortable:

  • Exterior walls are 2×6 with full cavity R-34 foam insulation
  • Cathedral ceilings/roofs are R-53 foam insulation
  • Foundation walls are R-10 full height exterior insulation
  • Frame floors are R-54 full cavity foam insulation
  • Final blower door test: 298 cfm@50 pascals, which translates to a significantly low 0.06 natural air changes per hour
  • Heating and cooling is provided by a geothermal ground source heat pump
  • Water heater is a tankless gas unit with 0.98 EF rating
  • The house also has active solar hot water system and 4.2 kw solar photovoltaic system
  • Whole house ventilation is provided by a heat recovery ventilator (HRV) at 110 cfm

With the impressively low air leakage rate, these energy systems combined to help the home achieve a HERS score of 33, representing that the Scekic-Osborne residence uses 67% less energy than a new home constructed to building code standards.

To learn more about this unique house – just the second LEED Platinum home in Wisconsin – read the informative article from Sept. 26 edition of the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, or download our one page PDF Project Profile on the home.