Richard Bruton TD, Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment
QUOTE – “This is the future”
further comments posted below – story courtesy front page Western People 8th April, 2019.
The Minister visited Earth House, which is Ireland and Europe’s best energy rated home holding the best SEAI A1 BER Certificate in the country. The home, built in 2006 is a typical Irish bungalow of just over 200 sqm in size. It has legacy issues around large heating and energy bills. However this home went through a simple transformation, a pumped cavity wall, attic insulation designed in smart way to scientifically stop the transfer of heat. Additionally, the chimney was removed and the addition of a whole house mechanical heat recovery. Then the magic sauce, a HONE Heat, Power & Drive System installed outside on the roof knocked this house straight into the 25th century on nZEB energy performance certification.
No passive building, no triple glazing, even the front door is still made of wood. No external insulation, no muddy boots through the house, in fact there was very little work in the house to disrupt a normal household.
It has the same windows, walls and doors it was constructed with in 2006, 13 years ago but it now has a revolutionary HONE Heat, Power & Drive System. The home which no longer has “any” energy bills makes all its own heat, hot water, electricity, tap water and is in all probability the world’s most sustainable building. It can also charge up to 4 electric vehicles at high power (22 KW charge points) all for FREE using Daylight as fuel.
This house is so warm and comfortable, every single room, daytime and night-time that it takes a while to get used to the concept. This home which has consumed over 35 MWhrs of energy (yes, 35 Megawatt Hours) in the last year of operation has done so for absolutely zero cost. 100% of the energy was made on site at the home, all heating, (even cooling, remember the heat wave), all hot water, all electricity, In fact over 13.7 MWhrs of electricity was made and consumed on site even though it is a “load” following electricity system (off-grid). There is no known house anywhere in the world that achieves this level of sustainability.
The project which is government certified as the best energy rated property was peer reviewed throughout its design by the Building Research Establishment UK (BRE) and this was funded by the European Commission.
HONE is a propitiatory daylight energy technology developed by Photonomi Global Group a.r.l.
The minister further commented:
“one of the more forward-thinking projects I have come across to date”
“It is a very impressive technology, and obviously at a stage where we are looking at 1.7 million homes which need to dramatically improve their heating performance and this is an approach which is different from the traditional one. It is a very exiting project”
“The design of panels that give much higher output of power than your standard solar panel, but also the integration of it into a standard home without dramatic disruption to the home while it is being done, those are impressive things for a consumer to look at because a lot of the fear of retrofitting is that that it would be disruptive.”
“This is the future”