Green house on watson - case study in energy performance and community service

In the spring of 2006 a GVSU engineering professor and her students designed an ICF (Insulated Concrete Forms) home that they built in partnership with a local not-for-profit housing agency and a local residential builder. More than 70 students worked on the house in the spring and summer of 2006.In the fall of that year a low income family moved in. The house was certified at the Silver level under the LEED-H Pilot Program in Grand Rapids Michigan and also certified under Energy Star as a 5 Star Plus home. A year and a half later we have a significant amount of data on the performance of this home - including measured temperatures of the concrete core of the ICF walls. This paper will describe the design of the home and the resulting energy performance in a format suitable for use in a Thermodynamics or Heat Transfer class. This will be followed by lessons learned in the process of this very ambitious community service project.