Category Archives: LEED Project

Obtains points or required for LEED certification

Why LEED?

Posted on March 16, 2012 by ellen

Good question. We bought this house in Arvada, Colorado on New Years Eve 2011. It is earth sheltered on the north and has passive solar windows and a trombe wall to the south. The garage protects the house on the … Continue reading →

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Preliminary LEED Rating

Posted on April 6, 2012 by ellen

LEED Start Up Process: 1. Contact a LEED for Homes Green Rater/Provider (No longer found on LEED site!) 2. Determine if the project is suitable for LEED. For us this was a phone, email discussion. (LEED for Homes Eligibility Guildlines) … Continue reading →

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Documentation for LEED

Posted on April 12, 2012 by ellen

LEED projects are all about documentation and verification. It is one thing to say the house is in a developed area or has an uninterrupted thermal envelope and another to document those so that it can be certified as having … Continue reading →

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Innovative Design Process

Posted on April 12, 2012 by ellen

Innovative Design Process (ID) is the first requirement in the checklist for meeting prerequisites and gaining points towards LEED certification. As a result of this project’s preliminary rating we have already met one prerequisite for ID and can document most … Continue reading →

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Why Seven Months Later?

Posted on November 15, 2012 by ellen

What happened? The Design Charrette was a big disappointment for me. I can say that now after months have gone by and some work has gotten done on the house. Each of the players did bring their expertise to the … Continue reading →

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HumaNature

Posted on November 16, 2012 by ellen

The Design Charrette changed the focus of the remodeling project. I went from dreaming of LEED glory to the hard facts of the limitations of a budget. We had committed $50,000 to the project. That is the whole project of … Continue reading →

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Structured Plumbing

Posted on January 21, 2013 by ellen

We are interested in wasting as little water as possible and to that end, we designed a structured plumbing system that allows for the hot water to circulate within a loop system of pipes to deliver hot water at the … Continue reading →

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Water Loop in Action

Posted on April 17, 2013 by ellen

The water supply trunk loop is connected and stubbed out. This is the longest above the concrete connection. The pipe near the wall will connect the washing machine and the other connection will run to the guest bathroom. This long … Continue reading →

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Radon Mitigation

Posted on April 19, 2013 by ellen

Zone 1 has the highest concentration of Radon in the ground. Radon has been found to be a naturally occurring cancer causing element that is concentrated in homes that have direct contact with the earth especially in Level 1 (Red) … Continue reading →

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Triangle Tube Boiler

Posted on April 21, 2013 by ellen

We first heard of small, highly efficient, condensing boilers from Melissa when she did our Energy Audit. After some research, I found many recommendations for the Triangle Tube boilers. They have stainless steel heat exchangers, and copper piping. They are … Continue reading →

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