Construction Future dwellings will generate as much energy as it consumes in a year

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Brett Bundale
Telegraph-Journal

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To the undiscerning eye, a new two-story Moncton home will look like a classic New England saltbox with a sloping gable roof, a transom above the front door and double-hung windows.

Enlarge Photo

Matthew Sherwood/Telegraph-Journal

Paul Arsenault, president and part-owner of AlternaHome Solutions Inc., stands in one of the many south facing windows of a single family home being built in Moncton. Windows facing due south receive the most light and can reduce the cost of heating a home. ‘A home with a good passive solar design can save around 30 to 50 per cent of heating costs,’ he says.

But a glance at the AlternaHome Solutions Inc. blueprint reveals the house will also have solar panels on the roof, a geothermal heat pump and a waste water recycling system to flush the toilet.

"We're building a net-zero energy home, which means it can generate as much energy as it consumes in a year," said Paul Arsenault, president of AlternaHome Solutions Inc., a Moncton-based sustainable-development construction company. "This is the home of the future."

The official sod turning ceremony for the cutting-edge home, sponsored by the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation, will take place today in northern Moncton. It will be the first of a thousand new homes set to be built in a 450 acre sustainable subdivision. Although AlternaHome Solutions is leading the project, the land is being developed by Moncton real estate company Vision Land Development Ltd.

The Cape Cod-style house will be constructed using energy-efficient materials and renewable technology. It will also be designed to absorb the heat from the sun during the winter months but stay cool in the summer.

"A home with a good passive solar design can save around 30 to 50 per cent of heating costs," Arsenault said. "The advantage and beauty of the sun in our area is that it's very high in the sky in the summer time but lower in the winter so if you design the house properly you can use a lot less heat or air conditioning."

Although the home will be connected to the NB Power grid, it will use net-metering, a two-way meter to record both electricity coming into the house and going back out to the grid.

"The home will generate more energy than it needs in the summer and so the homeowner can sell that extra power to the grid. But in the winter - when the days are shorter - the home will consume more energy than it can produce because there are fewer sunshine hours."

Although public utilities in some provinces offer a better rate to homeowners that sell "green kilowatts-" or energy from renewable sources - to the grid, Arsenault said NB Power has not offered this kind of incentive.

And building an energy efficient home that takes advantage of the sun and uses green technology may be expensive for some. Homebuyers can expect to start spending at least an additional $20,000 to the cost of their home.

But with increasing energy costs, Arsenault said an investment in green technology will pay for itself in ten years.

"Given the costs of heating and lighting a home this is an investment that will pay off quickly," he said. "The cost of a power bill may soon rival the cost of a monthly mortgage payment, so it's a worthy investment."

During the construction and for about a year once it's completed, AlternaHome Solutions will be giving tours of the three-bedroom home.

The Moncton-based construction company acts as an integrator of new technology, Arsenault said.

"We subcontract most of the work but people come to us because we're a turn-key solution," he said. "We make sure the latest research on energy efficiency and the newest green technology is used in a home harmoniously."

AlternaHome Solutions stays up to date on the latest green technologies with help from Yves Gagnon, the K.C. Irving chair in sustainable development at the Université de Moncton.