Climate resilience of a low-energy prototype house

Since its opening, the BASF prototype house at the Creative Energy Homes project has attracted significant attention due to the two main aspects of the design brief: energy efficiency and affordability. The house was built using modern methods of construction and incorporates a number of passive and active measures to achieve comfort. An evaluation of the home's thermal performance and potential climate resilience is presented in this article. An analysis of a summer period showed that, when occupied, the house presented a small degree of overheating with temperatures exceeding benchmarks. Subsequently, the house was dynamically simulated in future warmer climates where the issue was exacerbated even with mitigation strategies in place. The paradox lies in the fact that the rising risk of overheating may be a result in the effort to reduce energy demand for heating and this case study shows that this issue needs to be considered in order to avoid a rise in the use of air-conditioning in British homes.