Welcome to the archive of Construct Ireland, the award-winning Irish green building magazine which spawned Passive House Plus.
The feature articles in these archives span from 2003 to 2011, including case studies on hundreds of Irish sustainable buildings and dozens of investigative pieces on everything from green design and building methods, to the economic arguments for low energy construction.
While these articles appeared in an Irish publication, the vast majority of the content is relevant to our new audience in the UK and further afield. That said, readers from some regions should take care when reading some of the design advice - lots of south facing glazing in New Zealand may not be the wisest choice, for instance.
Dip in, and enjoy!
Recent allegations that a single leaf timber frame development in Leitrim was forced to incorporate an outer layer of blockwork in spite of no such requirement in the Building Regulations or by the local authority in question suggests that something is seriously amiss, as Frank Coles explains.
Ill-considered attempts to upgrade a building’s thermal performance can not only fail to save energy, but can also create serious problems for occupant health and building structure alike. Leading green designer Joseph Little of Joseph Little Architects investigates the particular problems associated with dry-lining single-leaf concrete block walls
An ambitious new community initiative aims to run Clonakilty on 100% renewable energy — and with similar projects sprouting up across Ireland and Europe, it offers one local example of how our Energise Ireland campaign can achieve its primary goal: weaning Ireland off fossil fuels and on to green energy.
In the fourth part of a series of articles on the condensation risks associated with insulating single lead dwellings, Joseph Little of Joseph Little Architects & Building Life Consultancy reveals serious problems with the approach taken by regulators, standards authorities and suppliers on the condensation risks associated with insulating single leaf walls.
Responding to the Department of Communications, Marine & Natural Resources’ Green Paper “Towards a Sustainable Energy Future for Ireland”, Mark Coyne, Technical Director of Dalkia Ireland, outlines the challenges and responses to the three main pillars of the Green Paper – sustainability, competitiveness and security of supply.
As the January 2006 deadline for implementation of the EU Directive on the Energy Performance of Buildings draws ever nearer, the Irish Government has spelt out its plans to delay the across the board introduction of building energy ratings until 2009. But how does this compare to other EU Member States?
Lenny Antonelli visits a new residential development in rural Carlow that boasts only the second and third certified passive houses in Ireland, and encouragingly, finds that meeting and exceeding the coveted passive standard wasn’t as difficult as expected.
High energy prices and growing public eco awareness is leading to a situation where people are giving existing homes energy upgrades on an unprecedented scale. Two recently renovated houses in Dublin are at the extremes of how even the most difficult existing dwellings can be made greener, as Jason Walsh reveals.
