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The Green Concept
Today, building “Green” means more than reducing the utility bill. From harvesting resources to the final demolition and disposal of a building, all things are considered. These considerations are measured against the building’s impact on human health and our environment. The more “Green”, the lower its impact. It’s a good concept for our future, but it’s also not new. Most of us who were involved with energy efficiency thirty years ago were also making assessments about the full impact of construction practices.
Kistler & Knapp Building Early Green Homes
In the early eighties we at Kistler & Knapp built five extremely energy conscious homes. Our methods were inspired by two successful research houses built in the seventies. The two research houses were the “Lo-Cal” house(s) built by the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and the Saskatchewan House built in Regina, Saskatchewan by the Canadian government.
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By old standards, most of the energy generated to heat a home was lost. So it’s not surprising that the success of both research projects came from their ability to retain heat. Using large quantities of insulation and meticulous considerations for eliminating infiltration of outside air, these homes required remarkably little heat. Fresh air and humidity levels were problems for many energy efficient builders of the time; however both of these problems had already been addressed with the introduction of air to air heat exchangers. Passive solar—orientation of the building and its windows—was also utilized, but because of the extremely low heat demand, their strategy was applicable to wooded parcels, too.
In my view, what both houses lacked was aesthetic appeal. Here, I thought, was an opportunity.
Building My House
The first energy efficient home built (1982) by Kistler and Knapp was my own. When I began, my wife was pregnant with our first child and also fully employed. So with funds from a VA loan, I went to work full time on the house. The two man crew was: Dennis Kistler and David Knapp. We finished, as planned, before the baby was born (picture plywood floors in the kitchen, etc, when I say “finished”). It was a modest house with some craftsman details intended to demonstrate “energy efficient” could mean fun, too. The house was, in fact, very efficient. My wife and I heated with wood — a cord per year or less. We still live there, but the house has undergone many changes over the years.
Gas Crisis of the Seventies Ended
As the gas crisis of the late seventies began to recede, so did interest in energy efficient homes. In the end, it was the high quality of our work, transparent accounting, and positive work relations that led to greater success at Kistler & Knapp.
Though interest in energy efficient houses faded, all was not lost. Many of the construction practices carried forward, and we’ve improved on them over the years, making them a routine part of building a fine home or a reliable place of work. Today there are many new and welcome products and systems directed at ever higher levels of efficiency in building performance and comfort.
Sorting Through the Hype
Consumer interest in energy efficiency is growing again and bringing with it the comprehensive considerations implied by the term “Green”. Simultaneously, “Green” has become a popular marketing tool, and, consequently, a tool subject to shallow use. Here, our long experience is helpful in sorting out what is meaningful and what is not in this quickly changing marketplace.
Dennis Kistler
President, Kistler & Knapp Builders, Inc. |
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