Welcome from Passivhaus Institut

Hello, everyone, and welcome to today's Project Spotlight on Passive House in hot climates. My name is Jessica Grove-Smith, and I'm a Senior Researcher and Joint Managing Director of the Passive House Institute, the research institute based in Germany and responsible for the International Passive House Standard for highly energy-efficient buildings.

More and more buildings are being built to the Passive House standard around the world, ranging from single-family houses to multi-family buildings, to much larger and much more complex building typologies. It's a great journey to be part of, and we're really encouraged by this growth and by this uptake worldwide. Still realistically, I have to say that there is a lot that we all can, and I think we all must do, to really transform to the market and the sector for better buildings, healthier buildings and climate-friendly buildings.

Events like this one, I really like them, because I think they're really important to share experiences across borders. Experiences from real-life projects, including the lessons learned, things that went well, and things that were particularly challenging for the project team.

So I'd like to thank Passivhaus Philippines for organizing this event, the speakers for presenting the project. And again, a very warm welcome to all of you who are here today for the learning about Passive House in hot climates.

We at the Passive House Institute, together with our membership network, the International Passive House Association, we advance research, we advance professional training, capacity building, and we do a lot of quality assurance work for highly energy-efficient buildings and high-performance building components. Whether it's insulation solutions, whether it's windows or ventilation systems, for example.

The available research and the many realized, implemented projects that are out there, they show the benefits of building and of living or working in an energy-efficient, healthy, and comfortable building, built to the Passive House Standard for new build projects, or the EnerPHit standard, as we call it, for retrofit standards.

Now, as the Passive House Standard was initially refined in Germany, where the Institute is based, some who are still new to Passive House might have questions about how it applies in hot climates, like in the Philippines. I can assure you, as a physicist myself, that the same laws of physics apply around the world, and I assure you that Passive House delivers in hot climates as well, where it's obviously all about reducing the cooling.

Today's project spotlight is about a very special project, which shows exactly how this can be done. And the two speakers, Jordan Parnass and Dylan Martello, they're two very experienced Passive House practitioners. And they'll be sharing how a garment factory in a very hot and humid climate of Sri Lanka was transformed into the first certified EnerPHit building in that part of the world.

Now, as you'll hear from them, one crucial aspect of energy-efficient design in hot climates is to keep out the heat. Sounds logical, sounds intuitive, but you have to think it through and really apply it consistently. So, for example, with good insulation, with carefully managing sizing of windows, and appropriate shading, as well as keeping the heat loads within the building low in the first place, for example, with efficient equipment.

Another important and really interesting topic is how to manage humidity in a humid climate. And really effective approach here is to use mechanical ventilation with humidity recovery, because that will ensure that the people inside have fresh air, but without bringing in all of the humidity from the outside air.

The Passive House Planning Package, or PHPP as we call it, was developed by the Passive House Institute, specifically to help designers find the right components for their Passive House. It's a design tool, which helps you choose the right components for your specific building and in your specific climate.

Now, as you'll see in today's example, using the PHPP and the Passive House methodology as a whole leads to really significantly reduced cooling needs for buildings in hot climates. And it's not only the energy needs for cooling as a whole. One big benefit is that the cooling peaks are also really substantially reduced. That means you can use smaller systems, you can use more efficient systems, and there is much less stress on the electricity grid.

So in addition for the benefits of your actual, just, local building in itself, there's also benefits for the energy supply, which is a benefit for the society as a whole. Not to speak about the reductions of carbon emissions, of course.

Now, I'm really into this topic, I'm convinced by the benefits and by the opportunities of energy-efficient buildings, so I could spend a lot of time talking to you more about Passive House in hot climates. But I don't want to keep you from today's webinar and diving into the details of this specific project.

So if you want to learn more, feel free to reach out to us at the Passive House Institute, reach out to Passivhaus Philippines. And I strongly recommend that you take a look online. There's a lot of information already available to go and read and learn. In particular, I can recommend the online Passive House resource, which we call Passipedia, and you can find on Passipedia.org, where there's a lot of information and resources dedicated to Passive House in different climates. There's always a lot of learning from actual implemented projects, so find a project in your area or in other parts of the world, and speak to people who are already doing this from their learnings.

Before I close, one last important thing, because we're here today not only for the Project Spotlight but also, to celebrate the launching of Passivhaus Philippines. So, big, big congratulations go out to Norman Garcia and his team. We're really delighted by the founding of an organization in the Philippines that is dedicated entirely to Passive House! We wish you all the best on your journey, and we really look forward to the prospects of working together to fight climate change and to provide healthy and comfortable buildings for all. So a big thank you, and a big congratulations!

And now, everyone, please get ready to take some notes and enjoy all the learnings and the insights from this Project Spotlight, showcasing how Passive House works in very hot climate conditions.