EEBA Academy

This 1924 Colonial home had fallen into severe disrepair before coming up for sale. As part of the muchneeded renovation, the new homeowners (two Steven Winter Associates, Inc. employees) wanted to eliminate onsite combustion and produce as much of their operating electricity as possible. Other goals included lower embodied energy materials and a healthy indoor environment. LEED v4.1 for Homes offered one platform to address energy, health, and materials. The home was gutted down to the foundation, framing, and floors before the year-long renovation. After the first 8 months of occupancy (July-February), the home produced 14% more energy than it consumed.

The Ultimate Z.E.N. Home features a 7.8 kWh rooftop solar array as a standard feature to help achieve net-zero energy goals. But instead of selling surplus electricity back to the local utility as energy credits, an innovative battery storage system scaled for single-family keeps it on site.

Residential energy is changing quickly with new mandates, greater demand for electricity and an aging infrastructure. Home builders today are meeting these challenges in new ways to build homes of the future today. With new strategies and solutions, home builders are building not just smart homes, but homes with smart, sustainable, resilient energy.

Confusion about all-electric building codes and cooking options got you turned off? Get plugged in to an empowering event with code-clarifying, myth-busting details that will turn you on to electric cooking for life with better cooking performance, safer, healthier homes and a sustainable planet.