Clarke Road, Squamish

In October 2020 we had the opportunity to work with Blue Water Concepts on a truly unique and inspiring project in Squamish. CEO Mike Van Capelle is a firm believer that if we stand any chance of curbing global greenhouse emissions and slowing down global warming, then the construction industry is a perfect place to start.

His Clark Road project will be Squamish’s first certified Passive House which is the design and the build of a 1900 sf single family home. We learnt from Mike that a certified Passive House relies on a five key elements:

• -Super insulated building envelopes.
• -An incredibly air tight envelope.
• -High performance windows.
• -Thermal bridge free construction.
• -A highly efficient HRV.

All 5 of these items result in an amazingly efficient building that costs very little heat and cool. It’s hard to believe that a house this size will only have an annual heating bill of around $140!!! When designing the house, they took into account the optimal angle for Solar on the roof and have pre-wired for solar panels to be installed in the future.

Ultimately the goal of this building design was to achieve passive house certification, but also to show that you can have large windows, tons of natural light and build an aesthetically pleasing home for  ≤15% of the cost of a regular code built home. Smart design for both the environment and your wallet.

Photos: Kristen McGaughey