Concordia College Builds the First Certified Passivhaus in North America

On November 2nd, 2006, the Northwest Regional CERT team toured what was described by one of the pioneers of the blower door test as “the tightest building in the U.S.” The Waldsee BioHaus Environmental Living Center outside of Bemidji is truly a marvel of green building design. After a round of introductions, Warren Schulze, the Assistant Director for Facilities gave the group an introduction to the Concordia Language Villages http://clvweb.cord.edu/prweb/.

The villages are part of Concordia College’s mission “to prepare young people for global citizenship,” and have 14 languages and cultural immersion courses in six villages. They figured since sustainability is also part of their mission and they needed more student housing, why not do an environmentally-friendly building to boost their environmental programming?

And so the BioHaus was born http://waldseebiohaus.typepad.com/biohaus/ in the German village. Edwin Dehler-Setter, the Environmental Education & Natural Resource Management Specialist, gave the rest of the tour. Using the German passivhaus design, the BioHaus uses 85% fewer BTUs than standard Minnesota construction. Based originally on the “2000 Watt Society” in Switzerland, this twostory, 5,000 Square feet building is the first certified passivhaus building in North America. Stephan Tanner, http://www.stephantanner.typepad.com/ the architect from INTEP, LLC, used cutting-edge building components and systems to achieve incredible energy efficiency:

Vacuum insulated panels (VIPs). First designed by NASA 30 years ago, 2” inch thick VIPs made of fumed silica sit on top of standard 6” walls to achieve an R-70 insulation value.

Where VIPs aren’t used, 20” thick walls are filled with 100% water-blown spray insulation and then covered by an additional 8” of expanded polystyrene(EPS) foam boards on the outside for an R-70 value.

Under the floor, 16” of EPS insulation prevent the warmth of the building from draining into the ground.

High tech triple-pane windows imported from Germany with cork insulation and a frame structure that eliminates thermal bridging between the interior and exterior of the building. The windows are rated U value 0.13.

A green roof system with over 2000 plants of eight species top off the building. In the winter the flat roof allows snow to accumulate and act as an insulation blanket, and in the summer the plants help retain rainwater and reduce erosion.

A unique air exchange & heat recovery system that is 85% efficient replaces 100% of the air inside while recovering much of the energy from the discharged air.

All the hot water needs are met with a solar hot-water system supported by the geothermal heat pump. The geothermal heat pump also pre-tempers the fresh air via 330’ feet of five earth tubes

A control and monitoring system gives students real-time energy information from sensors inside and outside the building.

Automated drapes drop to block sunlight and can change pitch to still allow light in.

Dual flush toilets to use less water.

To learn more about Concordia’s Waldsee
BioHaus Environmental Living Center,
please contact Edwin Dehler-Setter, the
Environmental Education & Natural
Resource Management Specialist, at 218-
586-8711; dehler@cord.edu.