The house, dubbed the Green House on Watson, will be certified under the U.S. Green Building Council's Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design for homes (LEED-H) program. Grand Rapids is a pilot site for LEED-H and this will be one of the first homes certified under the pilot program.
"We are definitely on the leading edge of something here," said Shirley Fleischmann, a professor in the Padnos College of Engineering and Computing at Grand Valley. She's helping spearhead the project. "When you do the heat loss calculation for this house, it's less than half of what you would normally use to heat a house this size."
MEDIA NOTE: The groundbreaking ceremony will be at noon Wednesday March 22 at 845 Watson S.W. (one block south of Fulton near intersection of Watson and Straight). Expected speakers include Fleischmann and Rev. Richard TerMaat of Westown Jubilee Housing.
For more than 20 years Westown Jubilee Housing has provided an opportunity for families that might not qualify for a conventional mortgage to purchase and own a home on the West Side through its homesteading program.
Daniel and Melita Powell have been selected as homestead family No. 37. The couple has eight children. Melita is the director of the food pantry and as a staff member of The Other Way Ministries, a sister organization to Westown Jubilee Housing and also a non-profit community development organization. Her husband, Dan (affectionately known as Boone), works at a Grand Rapids YMCA and officiates at college basketball games. Her mother also lives with them.
The utility costs will be very low, even with a large family living in it. The home will have nine-inch thick insulated concrete form walls and windows that beat Energy Star requirements by a third. Nu-Wool is donating insulation to make an attic with an insulation factor of R-50. The house will have Energy Star appliances, a high efficiency furnace, low-flow faucets and toilets to further reduce demand.
The Green House will also capture energy from the sun. Solar panels on the roof will provide hot water, and photovoltaic cells will generate 2 kilowatts of electricity. Any excess electricity generated will be sold back into the grid.
"We will be able to learn a lot from the house once it is occupied. The solar panels will be remotely monitored, sensors embedded in the walls will provide temperature data, and the family has agreed to provide copies of their gas, electric, and water bills. This data will be shared with other engineering schools, with schools in the K-12 system, and with professionals in the building industry," Fleischmann said.
This community-built house is the biggest community service project undertaken by the School of Engineering -- but its not the first with benefits to the West Side neighborhood.
"This is exactly the way that a university like Grand Valley should be active as an urban neighbor -- by applying the expertise at the university and combining it with practical skills and information from the building industry to provide an exceptionally energy efficient house that demonstrates environmental responsibility while improving the quality of life for our neighbors," Fleischmann said.
For more information, contact Shirley Fleischmann at (616) 331-6761. The project is still seeking volunteers and financial supporters. For more information on contributing, contact Rev. Richard TerMaat at Westown Jubilee Housing, (616) 458-4841.
