LEED versus Passive House Standards Commentary

Check out the commentary by Jacob Gordon. He reviews LEED versus Passive House standards on The Good 100 blog. Titled "Follow or Get out of the Way: The household name in green construction needs to innovate in order to keep up with the competition." Imagine if teachers gave out grades on the first day of school based on students’ promises of how hard they each plan to study. Oddly, we use this backward system to grade green buildings in the United States.

Umbrella House Reborn into Solar

Pugh+Scarpa Architects of Santa Monica adapted architect Paul Rudolph’s 1953 Umbrella House idea into a renovated California solar home. Rudolph's design used a trellis to shade the home from the hot Florida sun. P+S borrowed the idea of the trellis but installed solar panels into a steel-beam canopy that shades their new house, while providing electricity. The canopy is part of a 4.5-kilowatt solar system that powers almost the entire 1,900-square-foot house and the pool. There are 89 BP Solar amorphous photovoltaic solar panels mounted in the steel-beamed structures, on the roof, and atop the carport. “It’s not rocket science,” says project architect Angela Brooks. “Our system is simple. We used normal electricity. We did the wiring diagrams. It could all be done by a nonprofessional.”

LEED versus Passive House Standard

Check out this article that compares LEED versus the Passive House standard. Titled "Follow or Get out of the Way: The household name in green construction needs to innovate in order to keep up with the competition".
Writes the author, "Imagine if teachers gave out grades on the first day of school based on students’ promises of how hard they each plan to study. Oddly, we use this backward system to grade green buildings in the United States." Commentary is by Jacob Gordon on The Good 100 blog.