Passive House in Arteaga
The house is located in the building limits of Arteaga in the surroundings of the wetlands of the Urdaibai biosphere reserve. The watershed formed by the Oka and Golako rivers flow into Mundaka, where it forms an extensive estuary flanked by beaches. The climate is humid and temperate with rainfall throughout the year, although less frequent in the summer months. The land where the house is located is on the southern buildable limit of Arteaga. Its shape is irregular and presents a slight downward slope from south to north. On its eastern and northern sides, the site follows the curved path of the Bo Orueta road and on its southern side it borders rustic lands.
The house is accommodated along the Bo Orueta road following its concave shape to the south and adapting to the gentle slope of the terrain without hardly modifying or touching it. Large Markina limestone stones perched on ballast filled pits raise the entire house off the ground to allow the soil and air under the house to pass intact.
The gabled roof throughout the house expels the rain creating an intense curtain in front of the large windows and gathering around the perimeter of the house at ground level. Access to the house is through the central part of the north convex side. At this point, a large open hallway is configured that shelters the vehicles and the main access to the house. Inside, forty-six rooms of different sizes in correspondence with the degree of intimacy are concatenated throughout the house. Larger common spaces are complemented by smaller intimate spaces that wrapped up the individual without segregating them from the rest of the inhabitants. The total wood construction accentuates the feeling of shelter throughout the house and especially in the spaces in contact with the body where the house becomes furniture. The structure is in cross-laminated larch wood. The insulation is made of wood fibers or cork. The façade and roof cladding are in acetylated radiata pine finished with a gray silicate-based mineral patina.
In the design and construction of the house, passivhaus standards have been followed, insulating the four ventilated faces of the outer shell. Very hermetic enclosures with low emissivity triple glass and total absence of thermal bridges and air leaks have been developed. Exterior solar protections made of horizontal rolling slats of Soria pine have been placed in the areas most exposed to summer solar radiation. The extraction and supply of air from the house is constant and controlled by a double-flow mechanical ventilation system that incorporates a heat recovery unit to transfer part of the energy contained in the stale extraction air to the fresh air that is introduced into the house. With the sum of these measures, a 75% reduction in heating and cooling consumption of a standard home is achieved.
The house obtained the class A energy rating with an energy consumption of 22.43 kWh / m2 per year and emissions of 3.83 kg of CO2 / m2 per year. The power contracted with the electric company is 4.6 kW.
