CFA National Associate Dow recently held an open house for a passive solar all concrete high performance home designed to get the maximum benefit of state of the art insulated wall technologies.

The Greene/ Cassidy Home just north of the Perry Park Golf Course in Larkspur, Co., is sited to make the most of the inclination of the sun, in all seasons. To save even more energy, the building shell is constructed of “Poured in Place” formed concrete walls, and features a complete building envelope of extruded polystryrene insulation sandwiched between the concrete.

The assembly is held together with structural-grade, non-thermal bridging fiber composite connectors. This design eliminates thermal short-circuits in the walls, and creates a thermal storage capacity on the inside of the concrete building shell. The homeowners expect to benefit from substantial savings on heating and cooling costs through these strategies, as well as enjoying all of the other benefits of passive solar concrete construction.

“We are fortunate to have this opportunity to showcase the very high efficiencies possible with custom homes built with integrally insulated concrete” explains Jim Cassidy from NatureNet Homes. “Concrete by itself has virtually no R-Value, but it has a great energy storage ability. By placing the insulation to the outside of the inner mass, high performance walls are created. We also like the fire resistance, durability, quietness, security and all of the other benefits of building with concrete.”

Information was reprinted from CBG’s article “All Concrete Passive Solar Home Stores Energy in Walls,” September 2005