Solar Harvest a model of efficiency
Eric Doub and Catherine Childs just moved into a quiet home. “In the first week, we had 15-degree nights with wind, but the furnace never turned on because there isn’t one,” said Doub, president of Ecofutures, which designed and built the net-zero energy home.
There’s no furnace and no boiler because the home uses solar heat and extremely efficient insulation. The 4,585-square-foot home incorporates systems, appliances and controls so that the home supplies more energy than the couple and their two children consume. Extra electricity goes back on the grid through a net-metering agreement with Xcel Energy.
The house cost $940,000 to build, not including land costs, utilities setup and $83,000 in city fees. That comes out to about $20 more per square foot than what Doub calls a sieve, or the type of energy-inefficient house the family moved from, six blocks away. “In these 10 days since we moved, the heater there would have been cranking.”
Doub’s and Childs’ home, called Solar Harvest, features dozens of environmental features. There’s recycled content in the steel beams and columns. The doors come from the Habitat for Humanity Outlet, which sells salvaged building materials. The all-natural wool carpets and hemp/cotton backing have no dyes, pesticides or stain protections.
The home’s insulation has high R-values and the windows have high U-values (they keep the heat in). The super-insulated solar storage tank, a sort of solar boiler, collects hot water from roof-mounted solar collectors, providing water for household needs, thermal mass for the house, and even a spa.
Solar Harvest is the first home in the nation that met a building code without a furnace or boiler, Doub said. He’s working on a second net-zero energy home near the University of Denver.
The Retreat goes for the green
The Retreat, a house featured in this past summer’s Parade of Homes, is still on the market. But builder Russell Burton, of Burton Custom Homes, isn’t worried.
“When you build a Parade home, you build alongside six other builders. Consequently, you now have seven ultra high-end homes on the market, all on the same street at the same time. The natural absorption rate for something like that will take longer,” he said.
One thing that does differentiate The Retreat from other upscale homes is that it won a Built Green Award of Excellence. Built Green Colorado is a 10-year-old joint effort of the Home Builders Association of Metro Denver, the Governor’s Office of Energy Management and Conservation, Xcel Energy, and E-Star Colorado. The goal is to build homes that use little water, are energy-efficient and have other environmentally friendly features.
The award is based on a point system. The home earns points from a 200-plus item checklist, ranging from one point for using recycled-content mulch to 13 points for installing “reinforced cementitious foam-formed walls.”
The Retreat received 291 points, more than four times the amount required. The home’s green features include a well-sealed HVAC system, a roof guaranteed for a minimum of 40 years, a whole house HEPA filter, a central vacuum, a “water-wise” underground irrigation system and a heat-recovery ventilator to supply fresh outdoor air to the occupants.
Other amenities are also important to homebuyers. The home, near Castle Rock on 5391 Moonlight Way, is listed for $1.725 million and measures 5,700 square feet, and has four bedrooms, 4 1/2 baths and views of the golf course.
