RSS
Twitter
Facebook
YouTube
A newly built residence located at 258 N. 21st Street, in the NoBo development area of the King Lincoln District, was just awarded its LEED Platinum certification by the USGBC. That makes it the first LEED Platinum residential home in the state of Ohio.
Several weeks ago I was invited to tour the home by Roger Beck, a local Technology Education teacher at Worthington Kilbourne High School who helped to build the home along with students of the college preparatory Home B.A.S.E. (Building Academic Skills and Experiences) class.
It was on Sunday, March 1st when I walked over to take a look at this new home. I remember the morning well as it a mere 20 degrees outside, yet quite sunny. It made for a chilly 10 minute walk, but the stroll down a forgotten section of brick-laid East Spring Street through the middle of the King Lincoln District was otherwise rather pleasant.
At first glance, 258 N. 21st looks quite similar to the other new new NoBo homes recently built along this beautiful street. In fact, two doors down there’s a home built with the same base floorplan. The difference is entirely in the details.
We started the tour in the basement of the home where the most noticeable differences were in the high-tech systems located under the house. Roger excitedly gave me the rundown on how the Xantrex Grid Tie Solar Inverter was quietly working on a day like today to keep the indoor temperature effortlessly maintained. The system was also sending unused electricity back into the grid and keeping the electric bills running in the black. Any ounce of skepticism I had on using solar power in Columbus evaporated at the sight of watching a power meter running backwards.
We moved over to take a look at the hot water system, which Roger shared a laugh about. After they installed the solar thermal pre-heat tank, it was a bit of trouble to have it pass city inspection. He said that the inspector came out, took one look at it, and admitted that he had never seen anything like it before. It required a bit of extra legwork, but everything was eventually approved as being up to code. This system provides 70% of the home’s hot water needs via solar power while a smaller traditional hot water heater serves as a backup.
The 97% efficient furnace was installed by Northtowne Heating and Cooling. Roger mentioned that the ductwork had all been sealed as tightly as possible and that a fresh air intake was installed so that the furnace could regulate the internal air quality if not enough of it was being recycled with outdoor air.
Being a bit of an electronics geek, the one thing that really caught my eye in the basement was a wall panel made of of various switches, routers, boxes, and computer cabling. Roger described the smart electronics system that was wired throughout the house. Every light switch, every outlet, and every ceiling fan is tied into this central system and is programmable and accessible via a secure computer connection or PDA device. The future homeowner could potentially set every light in the house to a timer, as well as monitor the perimeter of the home with a network of security cameras.
As we headed upstairs, Roger noted the extra care that went into completely sealing off and insulating the basement. They used a special technique of adding a layer of foam beneath the basement slab to keep all moisture at bay.
We headed back up to the ground floor of the house which consists of an open floor plan where the kitchen, dining, and living room all share a large open common area. There’s also a half bath and several storage closets on this floor.
Roger described some of the detailed work that went into making sure that the materials being used on the finishes of the home were all sustainable and environmentally friendly. They utilized local materials, such as the maple hardwood floors were donated to the project from Sheoga, an Ohio company. They chose materials that were durable and would not require replacement or maintenance as frequently, such as some of the LED light bulb fixtures in the kitchen that have a 10 year lifespan and use a fraction of the electricity of a traditional bulb. The kitchen cabinets were made from formaldehyde-free wood that was Forest Stewardship Council certified. All of the walls have all been painted with specially purchased no or low VOC paints.
Most of these details were not things that were too apparent on the surface, but they all added up create an environment that would more beneficial for a homeowner in the long term.
As we climbed the stairs to the second floor, Roger noted that the carpets were also specially selected for their non-VOC qualities and the company that manufactures them (Shaw) also has a reclamation and recycling program that will take used carpets to reconvert back into materials for creating new carpets.
The upstairs is divided into three bedrooms and two full baths. The bedrooms had similar finishes with their carpets and paints. The bathroom floors have been finished with recycled-content ceramic tiles, and the toilets are all 1.1 gallon low-flush models that use a special air pump in addition to the water flow.
Next, we went outside to check out the backyard. This home has a detached garage and a fenced in yard. The first thing out back that is sure to catch anyone’s eye is the presence of a rain garden. It was designed specifically for the Ohio rain season and is fed by the downspouts from both the house and garage to keep water management on site. Keeping extra water out of the city’s storm drains helps to reduce erosion, pollution, and flooding. The rain garden is stocked with native Ohio wetland plants that are drought resistant. The yard has been seeded with a low-mow grass mix that requires two cuttings per year and no watering. The backyard also contains a stone patio area for outdoor entertainment, and a built in clothes line along one side of the garage for the option of line drying laundry.
(Note: My photo of the rain garden in March turned out a bit barren looking, but a nicer photo from last summer can be found by clicking here.)
As we headed back through the house and out to the front sidewalk, Roger continued to pepper me with plenty of additional bits of technical detail, cost saving estimates, and stories about the various companies, students, and organizations that made this home possible. I feel as if my writeup has only scratched the surface, but if you’d like to know more – an extremely detailed blog has been kept throughout the lifespan of the project and can be found here: homebase07.blogspot.com.
Additionally, a community open house is scheduled for Thursday, May 21st. More information can be found online at CHPColumbus.org and NorthOfBroad.com.
Awesome. Great to see this kind of example in Columbus. At least the city still allows clothes lines.
Wow! Those places look kind of awesome. I wonder if I can convince the husband to consider King Lincoln in our housing search. I know, there are great opportunities in that area, but its a bit too transitional atm.
Nice looking house. I would like to see more of this, especially in the KLD. It should set an example for future practices.
Impressive! Any idea of the final buildout cost?
The American Recovery and Reinvestment act just gave Ohio $629 million for energy improvements, community block grants and weatherization, so jump on it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YIDrtVE5zUY
Nice that’s a great looking place. I like how it maintains the look of the neighborhood.
I’ve noticed a couple of similar looking places (from the outside) in the 5xNW area. I’m sure they are not LEED Platinum, but one of Glenn Ave had some sort of LEED certification.
This is a HUGE step in the right direction, I’m glad to see homes like this being built. With all of affordable (and just plain cheap) homes on the market in desperate need of rahabbbing, I would like to see green renovations of an existing homes catch on.
I noticed the house is vacant, is it for sale, if so, do you have a link to the information?
I imagine the sale info will be available on the NoBo website sometime soon. They probably want to keep it open as a model for a little while before selling it, but I’m pretty sure it was 100% finished when I was in it a few weeks ago.
Heeeeyyy! I thought I was the greenest house…
I think the most impressive part of this is that teens helped to build it! What an incredible opportunity and amazing skills to build at such an early age. I’d be interested to know if these teens will go on to work in this field. I am amazed and encouraged by this young generation stepping up to this challenge.
I think the whole “NoBo” name is lame, but what they’re doing for the neighborhood as far as urban infill is absolutely commendable. Now if only some more attention would be focused on Long and Mt Vernon.
This is great. Especially if it garners more attention to green lifestyles. I do have two questions, though:
1) Does anyone know how much it cost to build? Like drew, I’m curious. I wonder how far this is from being mainstream.
2) Has anyone heard of Passive Houses? Here is the Wikipedia entry and a New York Times article. Apparently they kinda vex LEED ratings but are 90% more energy efficient than normal homes. They exist in the Midwest and apparently only cost 10% more to build than conventional homes.
Either way, the more of these the merrier!
Well let me speak directly about the project since I was intimately involved in the project and hopefully I can answer a couple of questions. It was a great learning opportunity for everyone. As for the students, only a couple of them actually went to college pursuing a degree in design or construction.
The intent of the home was to show that ANY home can be green. It will also eventually be for sale. However the Columbus Housing Partnership is going to keep it open for tours for a few years as a model home so to speak for affordable green homes. Also the home will be sold to families in need through government subsidies. So in that regards it will stay an affordable home.
As for the cost of construction, we are not 100% sure on the actual cost at this time. We received a lot of donations, so we are currently asking our donors for the value of the products that they provided. So we can go back and dissect what the true added cost may have been.
As for the cost issue and mainstream. That will not happen until people are more willing to put the added dollar into insulation or equipment to reduce their operating costs instead of opting for the granite countertop. But then again there are many different paths of green and I don’t have the time or energy to get into that now.
jlloyd – thanks for the info. Definitely good for the “R&D” factor, if you will. Certainly no reason that various combinations of techniques could be used on different construction projects.
I think cost is all relative when looking at green projects.
Very cheap, simple things like clothes lines, rain water collection, composting, gardening etc. can be done easily by all. Salvaging material for a home remodel or new build is another easy way.
The more expensive projects, like going off grid with solar or even just kicking some electric back to AEP, is all dependent on perspective. Need to blend margaritas and watch your hi def at 2 am? Solar will cost you big.
Good point. Little things add up, too.
I think there are a lot of people who just don’t think environmentally, but would respond to price incentives. For example, I don’t know much about them, but if these passive houses (see above) are the real deal I think even a complete anti-environmentalist might trade a 10% surcharge on building a home for a 90% reduction in energy bills.
I’m all about converting the non-believers and nudging people to make their de facto decisions greener.
Not wild about the design of the house but congrats on the LEED certification, thats a real accomplishment.
While I can understand the desire for a model home, it would be nice to have someone living in the house to work out the kinks in the system and start collecting real data about energy usage, payoff versus cost, and maintenance issues before they start building more of these.
If NOBO builds more of these houses, will they get each one LEED certification or just take the lessons learned from this one and apply them to future houses without the bureaucracy of LEED? I would do the latter.
Can we get more info on that low-mow grass? I hate cutting my grass and would love to only do it twice a year.
As the teacher whose class built this house, thanks to all who support this type of project. Also, Kandrews understands the enormity and uniqueness of having high school students who are basically going to college and have no experience in building and that signed on for a dedicated senior year to help change their world. What we did for ten years and building eleven homes was a constant struggle to garner internal support that other programs had. I received absolutely no extra pay, compensation or time for this any of this so your comments really help a very tired guy who thought educational change would be embraced.
To add to Josh’s comments, we don’t know the exact cost yet. What our team can say with confidence, is that if we took out all of our high end finishes that were basically donated, and built the home using our core green building technology and the science that makes this house energy efficient, green, durable, and comfortable, is that the cost of this home would be very equivalent to the conventionally built house at 250 21st St. which is almost the exact twin of our home. There are extra costs in our home but we did some smart things that lowered our costs too. Example: the 2″x6″‘ by 24″ on center walls of our home were built using advanced framing techniques that have almost the exact amount and cost of 2″x4″ walls at 16″ on center of a conventionally built house. On one of our tours, one home builders’ reflection was that “This house is nothing but good building.” – YES! That’s the point.
We had a three year plan, but circumstances truncated that. Our second home was supposed to be the same house stripped down but retaining all of the energy, indoor air quality, and sustainable things that make this home special. Through the building of this home, I had my hands on every detail of its construction. As a result, we accumulated a fantastic body of kowledge. We now know how to build a zero energy, yes, zero energy, home.
Any takers? No McMansions need apply :)
Seriously? Ugh:
Republican change on building code proposal may threaten stimulus funds
Columbus — Language that Senate Republicans slipped into the state’s transportation budget alters state building code standards added by House Democrats and could jeopardize $96 million in federal stimulus money for Ohio, according to Gov. Ted Strickland’s office.
Full article
I think the Ohio Home Builders Association should take a look at the American automakers and realizes what happens when you fight progress.