Passive House in The New York Times

Pablo Enriquez for The New York Times

There was an article published last week called The Passive House in New York. It really goes to show that the ball is rolling here in North America. I'm impressed by the mayor's initiative over there. It looks like they are poised to be at the forefront of the movement in the US.

It can be argued that Ottawa is leading the way here in Canada. Mark is currently working as the Passive House/Passivhaus (US/German) designer on a multi-unit community housing project here in Ottawa. He's working with Salus and CSV. If it achieves certification, it will be Canada's first multi-unit Passivhaus building. And how wonderful that it's 'supportive housing' and doesn't have developers thinking about how much more they can be charging for rent (as in the NYT article). He's working on another Passive House set for build this summer over in Chelsea. And there are a number of other projects in the works, by other fine folks, as well. Our project will be the first in Ottawa to actually gain certification (if we get it).

Now if only we could work on really bringing prices down. With all this momentum, a factory in China has opened up to manufacture Passivhaus-certified windows. Surely that will help. China is actually setting itself up to be the world-leader when it comes to Passivhaus builds. The factory to make these windows will be built to Passivhaus standards, becoming the world's first factory. They also have a giant hotel in the works. China doing China's thing. There's an economic drive now behind Passivhaus, which will hopefully benefit more of us in the near future.