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W W W. M A I N E B I Z . B I Z 29 J U LY 2 5 , 2 0 1 6 kitchen, bike storage, playground, com- munity garden, covered bus shelter, res- ident service coordination and 24-hour emergency maintenance. Passive house standards are increas- ingly well-known in Maine as a highly insulated structure with airtight envelopes, energy-recovery ventilation, high-performance windows and solar gain. Village Centre — now one of the largest passive house developments in North America — had to stay within cost limits imposed by the LIHTC fi nancing program. With Walter on the job, CHOM — which bought the property for $5,000 and was the project's developer — went into the project with LEED certifi ca- tion in mind. Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design is a third- party certifi cation program for high- performance green buildings, focused on material sustainability and environmen- tal quality. CHOM has completed other LEED projects in recent years. "We have forward-thinking board members who said, 'Let's think about a passive house structure,'" says CHOM Development Director Erin Cooperrider. e group had a site, building design, budget and permits. Wright-Ryan Construction in Portland was the gen- eral contractor. e challenge, Cooperrider says, was achieving passive house standards without changing the building's foot- print or exceeding a cost limit of $145 per square foot. With energy-modeling help from ornton Tomasetti, an engineering fi rm with offi ces in Portland, Walter and Wright-Ryan designed, priced and modeled multiple variations of wall type, insulation packages, envelope air- sealing and mechanical systems. "Most of those [variations] would work for a passive house. One of them would work for our budget," says Walter. " at was the real challenge. is kind of process is the same as every project, but another project might have 500 pieces to the puzzle. Just imagine hav- ing a 10,000-piece puzzle and trying to fi gure out how to do it." The fi rst passive house e fi rst passive house in the United States was built in 2003 by German architect Katrin Klingenberg, in Urbana, Ill., according to the non- profi t Passive House Institute US, which was founded by Klingenberg. PHIUS is today known as the leading passive building standards provider in North America. According to the PHIUS website, standards are based on climate-specifi c comfort and perfor- mance criteria, with the aim of fi nding "the sweet spot between investment and payback to present an aff ordable solu- tion to achieving the most comfortable and cost-eff ective building possible and the best path for achieving zero energy and carbon." Buildings designed and built to this standard perform 60% to 85% better than conventional construc- tion, PHIUS says. Village Centre is conventionally wood-framed with double-stud walls incorporating a foot of cellulose insula- tion. It's protected by an air-seal mem- brane and tube sealant that was meticu- lously applied to every penetration. e process is not rocket science, says Cordelia Pitman, director of pre- construction services at Wright-Ryan. What's essential is to make sure all sub- contractors — in this case, all 21 of them — understand the importance of the seal. "It's putting sealant around every- thing," Pitman says. "But if you don't lay out who's responsible for what, it doesn't happen. It's about completing the steps." "It was a lot more detail than I'm used to in a conventional build," says Walter. "Doing a passive house project is a much more integrated process, from designers to subcontractors through all the consultants. You're thinking through everything before you actually do it." Super-insulated, triple-glazed win- dows provide further climate control and also dampen noise. "Triple-pane windows are more expensive than what's typically allo- cated for a Maine housing project," WWW.NEPREQUAL.COM Construction Prequalification Services INFORMATION ASSURANCE TRUST 103 Park Street Lewiston, ME 04243 Tel: (844)NEP-QUAL (637-7825) PREQUAL builds a BETTER project. WWW.NEPREQUAL.COM Construction Prequalification Services INFORMATION ASSURANCE TRUST 103 Park Street Lewiston, ME 04243 Tel: (844)NEP-QUAL (637-7825) PREQUAL builds a BETTER project. P H O T O / L A U R I E S C H R E I B E R C O N T I N U E D O N F O L L OW I N G PA G E » F O C U S At the Village Centre in Brewer, a photovoltaic array is capable of generating 26 kilowatts of electricity.

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