Kingspan Off-Site To Reveal First Level 6 House at OFFSITE2007

Kingspan Off-Site will be revealing its innovative ‘Lighthouse’ net-zero carbon home in the Big Build Innovation Park area of the BRE’s OFFSITE2007 exhibition in June, which is the most advanced house design ever produced for mainstream construction. With unrivalled levels of efficiency in terms of the construction method, energy use, CO2 emissions and carbon footprint, this high performance, sustainable home pushes the boundaries of modern housing design and is the first to achieve the Code for Sustainable Homes Level 6, the standard to which all new homes should be designed and constructed by 2016.

Lighthouse is the next generation of Kingspan Off-Site’s range of sustainable house designs and the company is working alongside Sheppard Robson, Arup, MacFarlane Wilder and Davis Langdon to realise this vision for the delivery of affordable and sustainable homes.

The 93m², two and a half storey, two-bedroom house is being designed in line with Lifetime Homes and Scheme Development Standards (SDS) and every building material and component used has been specified for its ability to optimise the house design’s overall sustainability credentials.

Lighthouse will be constructed by Chorus Group using Kingspan Off-Site’s TEK Building System. With a U-value of 0.11W/m²K and airtightness of less than 1.0m³/hr/m² at 50Pa, this high performance SIPs (Structural Insulated Panel) based system delivers very high levels of thermal insulation and airtightness, to ensure that the designed heat loss values are achieved in practice. As such, the heat loss in the Lighthouse will be reduced by around two-thirds compared to a standard new house.

This super insulated, airtight building fabric has been designed to provide generous daylight levels and includes effective solar control, together with integrated building services based around a platform of renewable and sustainable technologies designed by Arup. These include water efficiency techniques, such as low volume, sanitary ware and appliances, and rainwater harvesting, as well as renewable energy technologies, including a biomass boiler, building integrated photovoltaic (BIPV) and solar-thermal array.

Lighthouse includes mechanical ventilation with heat recovery (MVHR), as well as a roof-mounted wind catcher, which provides passive cooling and ventilation. A waste separation system has also been included in the house design, which enables combustible waste to be used locally in central heat and power plants.

Services in Lighthouse will be integrated with smart metering and monitoring, which records energy consumption and enables occupants to identify if any wastage is occurring, helping to promote more environmentally aware lifestyles.

The LightHouse that will be constructed in the Big Build Innovation Park area of the OFFSITE2007 exhibition will provide a blueprint from which a range of house types will be developed. Importantly, this will allow the concept of this innovative house design to be incorporated into any masterplan scheme to provide homes with performance levels specifically tuned to meet whatever level of the Code for Sustainable Homes is required.

In addition to constructing the net-zero carbon house in the Big Build area, the Kingspan Off-Site Partner Alliance, which includes all the team members involved in the design and construction of the Lighthouse, will also have a high profile presence in the exhibition area of the event, where it will be demonstrating how this innovative and advanced house design has been developed.