From the 3-Liter House to the Zero Heating Cost House
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[B][B]From the 3-Liter House to the Zero Heating Cost House [/B][/B]
Innovative concepts by BASF reduce CO2 emissions and ensure low heating costs
The Story
Almost one third of Germany’s primary energy production is used for heating private households. An average old multi-family building consumes more than 20 liters of heating oil per square meter per year. This has consequences: for tenants, as they pay ever higher heating costs, and for the environment, as heating produces significant amounts of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide (CO2). It is different in the zero heating cost house in the Pfingstweide district of Ludwigshafen. There are no conventional radiators there, not even a stove. Instead, a sophisticated integrated system with innovative methods for insulating and ventilating the house ensures that residents are always comfortably warm and that hardly any CO2 is emitted. Luwoge, BASF’s housing company, devised and implemented the zero heating cost house concept together with its subsidiary Luwoge consult, a consulting company for energy-efficient construction.
For several years, Luwoge has demonstrated that with the use of BASF products and other components, it is possible to build or modernize houses and apartments in an energy-efficient manner. For example, in 2001 the company modernized an old building from the 1950s into a low-energy house – the first 3-liter house on an existing building. The heating oil demand of this house has since been less than three liters of heating oil per square meter of living space per year. “We have great expertise in modernizing old buildings into modern low-energy houses. The 3-liter house was purely a pilot project. At the time, we wanted to show what is technically possible – economic efficiency was secondary,” explains Karl Arenz, head of the Competence Center for Residential Construction and Modernization at Luwoge. “With the zero heating cost house, we now show that energetic building modernization is also economical.”
To ensure the building actually causes no heating costs, a multi-stage integrated system is used. First, the house is well wrapped with thermal insulation boards made of Neopor®. In terms of insulation performance, the modern Neopor® clearly outperforms its ancestor Styropor®: it contains small graphite particles that reflect radiant heat and give the material a silver-gray color. For optimal protection against energy losses, the windows in the zero heating cost house are triple-glazed and filled with noble gas between the panes.
Another component of the energy efficiency concept in the zero heating cost house is the heating, as no radiators are found throughout the house, even though it is not a "zero energy consumption house." What initially seems paradoxical is based on the idea that the house generates the (low) heating costs itself. It uses the energy of the sun: solar cells on the roof generate electricity and feed it into the grid. The proceeds cover the costs for the warm apartments. The zero heating cost house also provides hot water itself – with solar collectors on the south facade of the house. “A controlled ventilation system with heat recovery ensures good air quality and optimally uses the heat of the exhaust air,” says Karl Arenz. The ventilation system extracts used air from the kitchen and bathroom. This warm indoor air is used to temper the cold fresh air via a heat exchanger. More than 80 percent of the exhaust air heat can be reused in this way, and fresh air continuously flows into the house.
The heating is so well hidden that one does not notice it at first: it is integrated into the windows. The inner pane of the triple-glazed windows is coated with an invisible, ultra-thin metallic layer that is electrically conductive. When a low voltage is applied, this layer heats up similarly to an electrical resistance heater, and the heating windows generate pleasant radiant heat. To prevent this heat from being emitted outward, the outer pane of glass is coated with a heat-reflecting layer. In addition, the spaces between the triple glazing are filled with a noble gas that conducts heat less well than air. A comfortable room climate is achieved faster and with less energy than with conventional heating systems. However, the window heating is not intended for continuous use. It is only used when particularly low temperatures prevail outside.
The Perspective
In Germany, there are around 36 million housing units, of which about 24 million were built before 1979, at a time when awareness of energy-saving construction was not yet so advanced. The amount of CO2 that can already be saved by simple insulation measures is illustrated by the following calculation example: if an old multi-family building consuming 25 liters of heating oil per square meter per year is renovated to a 7-liter standard, the residents of an 80-square-meter apartment not only save 1,440 liters of heating oil per year but also reduce CO2 emissions by 4.6 tons annually. The share of private households in total CO2 emissions in Germany is about 14 percent or a total of 120 million tons per year.
Currently, the legally prescribed maximum consumption values of the Energy Saving Ordinance (Energieeinsparverordnung) are seven liters per square meter per year for new buildings and eleven liters for old buildings. The projects mentioned show that the technical possibilities exist to significantly undercut these requirements. “About 600,000 housing units are due for modernization each year,” says Karl Arenz. “If all of these were modernized energetically to the 7-liter standard, approximately three million tons of CO2 and almost one billion liters of heating oil could be saved annually. In addition, there would be a positive effect on the labor market.”
Pilot Project 3-Liter House
In 2001, Luwoge launched the pilot project 3-liter house in the Brunckviertel district of Ludwigshafen. An old building from the 1950s was modernized into a low-energy house. This was made possible by extensive thermal insulation with Neopor®, triple-glazed windows, a controlled ventilation system with 85 percent heat recovery, and the latent heat storage Micronal® PCM. The latent heat storage, integrated in gypsum boards or wall plasters, absorbs heat during the day so that the apartment stays cooler longer on hot summer days. The 3-liter house has become a worldwide showcase project, and the energy values have even exceeded expectations: the average consumption in the 3-liter house is 2.6 liters of heating oil per square meter of living space per year.
Internal Insulation in Old Building Modernization
Luwoge also demonstrated that a residential building over 100 years old does not necessarily have to remain an energy waster with the modernization of an old master’s house in 2005. The house, built in 1892 in the BASF company housing settlement “Alte Kolonie,” now consumes only six liters of heating oil per square meter of living space per year. Optimal thermal protection measures reduce energy demand, whereby a new generation of gypsum board composite panels with Neopor® as internal insulation was used.
New Construction of 1-Liter Urban Terraced Houses
In the Brunckviertel district of Ludwigshafen, Luwoge has built 46 new urban terraced houses to the 1-liter standard. The key to energy efficiency here too lies in extensive thermal insulation: up to 60-centimeter-thick Neopor® insulation boards and triple-glazed windows with noble gas filling ensure that no heat is wasted. The controlled ventilation system with heat recovery also serves this purpose. A small combined heat and power plant provides the additional heat needed for all 46 apartments and supplies the 1-liter houses with electricity and hot water.
