Introducing The Spring Street Passive House: A Healthy Home Project By Kristof & Diane Irwin

For two decades, our work at Positive Energy has been driven by a single, powerful question: why aren’t buildings created to better support the people inside them? We’ve dedicated our careers to answering that question, moving from hands-on custom home building to the forefront of building science and MEP engineering. Now, we’re bringing that journey full circle by taking on our most personal project yet: our own family home, the Spring Street Passive House.

Architectural Design, Building Enclosure, Building Science, Dehumidification, Electrification, Embodied Carbon, Environmental Design, Filtration, Healthy Home, Heat Pumps, High Performance Homes, HVAC, Indoor Air Quality, Mechanical Design, Natural Building Material, Passive House, Phius, Plumbing, Solar, Ventilation, WildfirePositive EnergyJuly 3, 2025Spring Street Passive House, Resilient Design, Human-Centered Design, Columbia River Gorge, Positive Energy, MEP Engineering, Building Science, Diane Irwin, Kristof Irwin, Blue Heron Builders, Diagnostic Performance Testing, Forensic Building Science, Human and Planetary Thriving, The Building Science Podcast, Passive House Standard, Passivhaus, Fabric-First Approach, Phius Standard, Phius CORE, Phius ZERO, Thermal Control, Continuous Insulation, Thermal Bridge Elimination, Air Control, Airtight Construction, Blower Door Test, Balanced Ventilation, Heat Recovery Ventilator (HRV), Energy Recovery Ventilator (ERV), Radiation Control, High-Performance Windows, Triple-Glazed Windows, Optimized Solar Gain, Shading, WUFI Passive Software, Moisture Control, Occupant Health, Building Durability, Extreme Winds, Temperature Extremes, Wildfire, Air Quality, Geological Conditions, Soil Conditions, Foam-Free Enclosure, Embodied Carbon, All-Electric Design, Radiant Heating, Radiant Cooling, Air-to-Water Heat Pumps, Net-Zero Energy Building, Rooftop Solar Array, Thermal Comfort, Indoor Air Quality, MERV Filters, Acoustic Comfort, Psychological Security, Environmental Pollutants, Sustainable Housing, Building Decarbonization.

Wildfires, SARS-CoV-2, & Portable Room Air Cleaners

If wildfires are to be a more frequent and intensive aspect of life in the US and future pandemics are not out of the question, how do homeowners start addressing their air quality to improve the safety their homes can provide? We’ve heard from many clients, friends, and family members in wildfire affected areas asking questions like this so we thought it was worthwhile to expand our air quality focus beyond just SARS-CoV-2 and provide some meaningful content that can serve wildfire sufferers as well. Enjoy some applied scientific guidance on the topic of portable room air cleaners (or PRACs).

HVAC, Wildfire, Indoor Air Quality, Healthy HomePositive EnergySeptember 17, 2020Wildfires, SARS-CoV-2, Air Quality, Portable Room Air Cleaners (PRACs), Clean Air Delivery Rate (CADR), Air Changes Per Hour (ACH), Filtration, indoor air quality, Indoor Air Quality (IAQ), Indoor Air Quality Concerns, filtration, MERV, Healthy Home

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