Flat-Pack Passive House
Innovating Micro-Dwellings for Permanent Supportive Housing
Today, in 2024, there are over 300,000 homeless individuals in America. Tens of million dollars are spent every year across the country to deal with the problem of homelessness, yet is it a growing problem. There are many well intentioned and, at times, effective approaches to solving the problem, but one of the most promising methods is the “Housing First” permanent supportive housing model. Housing First provides immediate, permanent housing to stabilize the lives of homeless individuals. The idea differs from traditional approaches in that stable housing is prioritized and offered first without preconditions on behavioral health management or other qualifying criteria. The idea is based on the premise that meeting basic needs, such as housing and food, better position people to deal with the other fundamental challenges they are facing such as addiction or employment. Placing individuals in housing gives them the stability needed to participate in helpful programs available which, in turn, make these programs more effective.
But providing quality, no-cost housing for hundreds of thousands of Americans is not easy. Good housing for just one person can be in upwards of 20,000 dollars, depending on location and other factors. In order to expand reach to accommodate and impact a substantial portion of the homeless population, creative individuals and groups have experimented with micro-housing as a solution. Small, cost effective structures can provide individual, dedicated units to more people. Clustering these tiny houses has the added benefit of fostering a supportive community that can be targeted with supportive programs.
In appreciation of this new approach, we participated in an ideas competition in Chicago for the design of a micro permanent supportive housing community. Our take on the idea was to create an enclave of independent small units arranged in a complex with shared common spaces. Each unit would have their own bathroom, kitchenette, bed and living space while communal gathering space and supporting facilities such as laundry rooms would be shared. Moreover, we wanted to make the complex cost-effective, easy to construct and extremely energy efficient to reduce operational costs and improve comfort and quality of life.
Our solution was the Flat-Pack Passive House concept. The Flat-Pack Passive House is a flexible, high-performance tiny house built from a special modular construction system. The system together with the application of energy-saving strategies and passive design principles reduces annual energy demand by as much as 70%. The complete approach incorporates all-natural materials, no embodied toxicity, almost zero embodied energy and virtually zero GWP.
The Flat-Pack Passive House is a flexible, high-performance tiny house built from a special modular construction system. The system together with the application of energy-saving strategies and passive design principles reduce annual energy demand by as much as 70%.
In contrast to the typical tiny house built on a trailer chassis, the Flat-Pack Passive House is quickly assembled on site using a versatile, prefabricated panelized system. The panels, built of plywood sheathing and internal ribs, are fully load bearing, usable for walls, roofs or floors. The lightweight panels can be erected easily on site with low-skilled labor and basic tools. And the light weight module can be cost-effectively mass produced and shipped flat-packed anywhere. Using a modular construction system allows structures to be re-configured, expanded, dismantled or reused, giving ultimate flexibility for tiny houses to evolve and grow to meet changing demands.
The panel is also super-insulated, filled with natural fiber cellulose insulation. With high-performance windows and doors, the envelope is air-tight and continuously insulated. The result is an interior that can be warm and comfortable for days during winter months without mechanical heating. Comfort level is enhanced with operable windows providing cross ventilation and with a continuous balance energy recovery ventilator for maximum comfort and improved indoor air quality. The demand reduction is also supported by solar gain and shading control canopies that can be tuned and balanced to deliver comfort in all seasons.
These passive design properties enable the house to operate with significantly less power and be fully supported by rooftop solar energy. With integrated battery storage, all appliances, heat pump, and LED lighting are powered on 12v DC power, thus avoiding solar power loss through typical DC to AC conversion. For convenience a DC-AC power inverter and line power from the grid are provided as backup, but are not needed for routine operation.
Combining these readily available technologies to create a micro-housing complex can create high quality, cost-effective, and operationally efficient new permanent supportive housing that can be easily deployed for greater impact. While not a universal solution, the Flat-Pack Passive House concept is intentionally provocative to encourage creative thinking for solving a persistent social problem.
Project done with Kevin Day and Michael Hindle
Passive House Analysis Done by Michael Hindle
