Posted in Residential

Living Pods and Naturescapes: Transforming Residential Areas into Sustainable Living Environments

As an Architect, I’m able to see a bird’s eye view of trends in design. A significant movement that continues to expand in our consciousness, is how to create a sustainable world (for ourselves and generations to come) amidst an expanding population and increasing use of natural resources.

Now more than ever, we see people responding to this challenge. We are re-discovering our fundamental connection with the earth and with each other and communities are being created around environments where food, nature and aesthetics are re-united.

Paul Barnett

My own work on “Living Pods”, a term I use to relate to home habitats, has developed over many years, as I acknowledge an increasing need to design and implement living environments that are in harmony with our beautiful world.

Living Pods are flexible living habitats that combine to create a diversity of living environments for couples, mixed family units, several groups or single people at any stage of their lives. The concept is based on single and multiple small buildings that enable privacy as well as social interaction. They are accessible, adaptable, natural and beautiful spaces to inhabit.

The Living Pod system sits at the pinnacle of sustainable design. Their footprint is small, requiring less materials and energy. Using Solar Passive and Passiv Haus design elements, the pods are carbon neutral and are built from sustainable and natural materials. The concept elegantly integrates greenhouse areas that connect interior space to nature and enable an indoor garden with extended growing seasons.

The Living Pod system is also perfectly designed to harmonise and integrate with natural, water harvested landscapes. Waterharvesting involves creating an underground river bed system that appears in the landscape as small creek beds. Tested over 25 years, waterharvesting has been shown to enhance subsoil environments for trees, shrubs, ground covers and edible gardens fed by rainwater and grey water. There is no maintenance of the waterharvesting system, it is natural and utilises microorganisms to digest greywater particles.

An environment created with living pods and naturescapes enables families and friends to grow through generations in a healthy, dynamic and sustainable living space, which supports the cycle of life with social enhancement, and connection to an abundant naturescape.

Paul Barnett is an Architect specializing in Sustainable Building and Naturescapes in Schools, Urban Spaces and Housing. He currently working on 10 star Living Pods and Naturescapes in Schools and urban areas.

Sustainability the new goal in home design

Domain

A competitive return on investment is drawing more buyers to energy efficient homes, writes Amelia Barnes.

The vast majority of Australian homes cannot be classed as sustainable. Often derivative of American or European architectural styles that aren’t designed for the country’s unique environment and context, Australian homes are historically poorly insulated and made from materials selected primarily to keep costs down.

While the term “sustainable” is often used in design without true consideration of its definition, this most accurately means “a home that meets the needs of present generations without compromising on future generations”. Using efficient energy and materials both in production and in operation, a sustainable home benefits its current residents as much as its future occupants. They seek to embrace their environment, use natural materials, and are constructed to encourage passive temperature control.

Unlike design trends that fade over time, a sustainable home carries fewer ongoing utility costs, most often due to the implementation of solar energy generation. Until recently, buyers have struggled to place a price tag on existing solar systems, but as more owners of sustainable homes report lower bills, Australians are increasingly seeking out these features.

Agent Meg Pell at Kay & Burton says solar power, rainwater tanks, spring-fed dams, fruit orchards and properties with a north-facing orientation all add value and appeal to listings.

“It is certainly true to say buyers are seeking a more hands-on, back-to-basics, cleaner air, smaller footprint lifestyle for themselves, their kids and grandkids,” Pell says.

Developers and architects are also responding to this change, with numerous companies and organisations solely dedicated to sustainable design.

25 Eastern Grey Rise, Flinders.

Tips for sustainable home design

  • Tell your builder  of your commitment
  • Incorporate good passive solar design for natural heating in winter and cooling in summer
  • Orientate your home for north-facing windows to  bring sunlight into living spaces
  • Install double glazed windows
  • Install solar powered electricity and water systems where possible
  • Choose energy efficient appliances with a high star rating
  • Install a rainwater tank for gardening, toilet and laundry water use
  • Use recycled building materials where possible

View the full article here.

 

Are sustainable houses worth more?

AFR, 11 September 2015.

'We produce more power than we use. We export it to the grid': builder Jeremy Spencer inside the environmentally sustainable house he has designed for his family in Seaholme in western Melbourne. Pat Scala

‘We produce more power than we use. We export it to the grid’: builder Jeremy Spencer inside the environmentally sustainable house he has designed for his family in Seaholme in western Melbourne. Pat Scala

Jeremy Spencer built a house for his family and parents to move into last year. The three-bedroom, two-storey house in Seaholme, in Melbourne’s west, meets several needs – it’s accessible in its design, with wide passageways, ramps and counter-hung benches that permit his wheelchair-bound father to fully participate in the family life.

It’s also sustainable. The house is built with materials such as a recycled concrete-and-glass slab and recycled bricks on the inside to create a thermal mass that absorbs northern sun in winter and diffuses it at night. It also has a solar panel system on the roof.

“Our heating and cooling expenses are extremely low,” Mr Spencer said. “We produce more power than we use. We export it to the grid when we produce excess.”

Spencer’s house cost $525,000, or $2200 per square metre and it’s one of a range that his design and construction firm Positive Footprints builds. So how much more does sustainability cost?

“With all houses we’re putting about $20,000 of extra stuff in,” Mr Spencer said.

It pays off.

“The average Melbourne home has a power bill of about $2300 per year,” he said. “That’s the sort of savings that we’re getting.”

Read the full article and more on sustainable housing here.

Australia named ‘world’s greenest property industry’

Real Estate Business Online

Australia has again placed first in an international ranking of sustainability in real estate.

For the fifth year running, the region of Australia and New Zealand topped the annual survey, which is conducted by GRESB, a Dutch-based industry group.

Property companies in Australia and New Zealand achieved an average score of 69, which was well ahead of the other regions.

Property Council of Australia chief executive Ken Morrison said the Australian property industry should be proud of the result.

“Not only is our industry keeping the economy growing and providing jobs for more Australians than almost any other – we are doing it sustainably, ranking as the world’s greenest property industry,” he said.

“We are showing unheralded leadership when it comes to sustainability, regularly going well beyond what is required and, in the process, creating buildings, public spaces and communities of which future generations can also be proud.”

Read the full article here.

Sustainable living put to the test in Bondor-QUT study partnership

Sustainable housing is increasingly sought-after by Australians – but how effective are current strategies and products used in sustainable construction?

A study, which sees Queensland University of Technology (QUT) team up with Bondor, aims to find out.

Residential homes in each state constructed using Bondor’s innovative InsulLiving® building products, InsulWall® and SolarSpan®, will be monitored over an extended period of time to evaluate how Bondor’s high performance thermal building system meets the needs of the residents in relation to both energy cost savings and comfort.

Bondor, sustainable livingQUT’s Dr Wendy Miller and Bondor have been working closely since 2009 when Bondor first began marketing to residential homes. This is their third joint project.

The goal of the project is to develop an Innovations Adoption Toolkit (IAT) that will enable housing supply chain agents to identify and implement innovations with benefits for all stakeholders.

Bondor’s InsulLiving® national sales manager Paul Adams said Bondor’s long-term partnership with Dr Miller and QUT was an excellent way to continually review the benefits of building products and construction methods that promote sustainable living.

“As always, we are excited to be a part of this project and look forward to seeing the results,” he said.

“Anything which works towards a more streamlined and widespread approach to sustainable living is something which we at Bondor are enthusiastic about.”

Dr Miller said the project would look at innovation within all areas of the housing market, from homeowners and real estate agents to builders and manufacturers like Bondor.

“This particular project came about from previous research saying that sustainable housing wasn’t a focus in standard methods of housing construction, and it was hard to cater for customers who wanted something more sustainable,” said Dr Miller.

“So we wanted to find out if there were leaders in the market working on construction methods which lent themselves to sustainable living, and how they were doing so.

“We are hoping to show that doing things differently to ‘business as usual’ has benefits for everyone – the supplier and the consumer.”

Each home under analysis will be measured in a range of areas including temperature, electrical circuits, thermal imaging and air tightness.

The project began seven months ago and ends in 2017, with the first set of results to be available from mid-2015.

Further information on the study and a full overview of expectations: Toolkit for transforming Australian housing: behaviour, culture and practices.