ᐅ Solid construction passive house as a bungalow

Well, concrete is not quite that simple either.

A brief excerpt from Wikipedia:
The following damage mechanisms can occur:

• Reinforcement corrosion due to carbonation of the concrete
• Pitting corrosion of the reinforcement caused by chloride ingress
• Concrete deterioration as a result of:
• Sulfate attack
• Alkali-silica reaction
• Lime leaching
• Freeze-thaw cycles

Surface protection systems, such as coatings or impregnations of concrete surfaces with hydrophobic agents, serve to improve durability and can be applied either immediately after casting or as part of concrete repair measures aimed at extending service life.
Concrete repair also includes all measures taken to fix damages (cracks, spalling, etc.) and to restore or improve the original protective properties of the concrete as much as possible.

As mentioned before, the quality depends on workmanship and maintenance. What you see in Rome are predecessors of modern concrete, but concrete as we know it today only existed from the time of Monier onwards.

Again from Wikipedia:
Another major advancement was the invention of reinforced concrete by Joseph Monier (patent: 1867). For this reason, reinforcement steel or rebar is still occasionally referred to as Monier iron.

The problem with all these materials, including your bricks, lies in their production. Resources that are not renewable are consumed for bricks, cement, sand (which is not unlimited), and steel. The production process (except for sand of course) requires a huge amount of energy. Therefore, my conclusion is that we cannot do without steel and cement, but do we need to use these materials in such quantities? As much as necessary, as little as possible. Now, surely someone will criticize me and say we are cutting down our forests. Yes, forests around the world are being cleared to burn wood, for chemical use, to produce paper, and to create space for crops producing completely pointless biofuels. We have and will continue to have enough wood in the future to build our houses with it without any problems.

A small digression into wood philosophy was necessary here.

This is about insulated, airtight and windproof building envelopes, orientation of the house, window areas, thermal bridges, and so on.

Best regards,
Friedrich

Hello Friedrich,

friedrich27 schrieb:

You do realize that some of the oldest buildings in the world (meaning those that are also inhabited) are made of 100% pure wood.

Sorry, but when I read that, I always think of the prefabricated house industry, which advertises with exactly that slogan. What they fail to mention is that modern prefab houses have nothing whatsoever in common with the houses used in their marketing slogans.

To stick with your favorite reference source (beware – the entries are, if at all, only superficially checked for accuracy), one of the oldest surviving churches is the Hagia Sophia; today a mosque.

Regards, Bauexperte

:rolleyes I already know that, the point was just that it is wrong to generally consider wood as a building material less durable than stone or concrete. Simply leaving a building unoccupied is enough to cause even a wet-built house to rot very quickly. Yes, and the durability of a building today depends much more on contemporary taste and technological development than on the building material itself. Just to be clear, I am a strong advocate of timber construction, but not a fan of prefabricated houses. Why? Because many advances in modern timber construction are implemented there only very slowly. Prefab house builders are good when it comes to the style of the houses, but the basic structure often looks quite weak. I’m talking about things like vapor-open construction, installation layers, insulation materials, and so on.
And regarding Wikipedia, what I copied from there fits, doesn’t it???
Best regards, Friedrich

friedrich27 schrieb:
Resources such as bricks, cement, sand (which is not endlessly available), and steel consume non-renewable materials.

Regarding bricks and sand, I disagree. Bricks are mainly made from clay mixed with sand to reduce plasticity. Clay is a weathered rock product. Even while you were writing this sentence, weathering processes of clay or sand were likely ongoing somewhere. Sand is essentially just fine-grained weathered sedimentary rock.

If you allow wood to regrow, then please also acknowledge the natural replenishment of clay and sand, even though they do not grow like green trees.

As always, thanks first for the answers and also for the explanations about renewable raw materials.

For us, the question remains whether the cost of hiring both a structural engineer and an architect is the same as hiring someone who can do both...

And whether we have forgotten anything else?

Or rather, what would be the best type of insulation?

Hello,

Hugh60 schrieb:
...
- I have read a lot about passive houses online, and one website said that it is almost impossible to build a bungalow as a passive house.

Why and how? That is complete nonsense! Any building can be designed as a passive house!
Whether it is truly economically viable in each individual case depends on the specific project conditions.
If built at the Zugspitze, the additional investment compared to the energy saving standard would definitely pay off. In a mild climate location, questions about the overall cost-effectiveness certainly arise!
A passive house can be built with solid construction, single-layered—depending on how you define solid—without additional insulation, it is not that simple.
Here, lightweight construction or multi-layered wall assemblies are usually more practical!

Best regards