From the Construct Ireland archives

Sustainable Urban Drainage System by Padraig Doyle, Brian Hennelly and Don McEntee.

The rapid emergence of sustainable building in Ireland has been heavily influenced by the techniques of early-adopters extending from Scandinavia, to Canada, to Germany and Austria. John Hearne visited a recently completed timber home in Galway which uses Austrian know-how to couple air-tightness, high levels of insulation and healthy materials with a sustainable approach to heating and ventilation

High levels of external insulation, abundant natural light and a minimalist approach to ventilation are ensuring that Malahide Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club is as green as its courts

As policy makers start to set mandatory low energy and renewable energy requirements as conditions of planning, the ability of the construction industry to find sound low-cost ways of achieving the new standards is becoming a key factor. John Corless speaks to leading sustainable building consultant Jay Stuart of Delap & Waller EcoCo and Paul Gilmartin of Ecobead to discover an approach with enormous potential for en-masse usage.

Heat recovery ventilation, a technology that has become a standard building application in Scandinavian countries, is rapidly gaining recognition in Ireland as a solution to both problems.

With banks in America and the UK encountering major difficulties as previously booming economies head towards recession, a similar and perhaps even worse fate may be awaiting Irish banks. Worryingly, the situation is shaping up to be so bad, that the very future of the banks may be under threat, as Richard Douthwaite explains.

SEAI recently proposed a series of changes to Deap — the software tool used to calculate BERs — including a reduction in its primary energy factor. But while this will benefit electrically-powered heating devices, some in the industry still feel systems such as heat pumps are disadvantaged by Deap and the BER system

External insulation examined: the reasons why placing insulation outside makes most sense, with six example projects

Jason Walsh spoke to David Smith of O'Mahony Pike Architects about the practice's uniquely-designed show apartments for this year's Myhome.ie Spring House and Garden exhibition.

Any building, no matter how cold and draughty, no matter how remote, can be improved to world-class energy performance, as an upgraded and extended Donegal cottage dating back to the 1800s proves.