Rachel Rennard and Mike Bratina commissioned, own, and live in Clay Brook Passive House, the first final certified single-family Passive House in New Hampshire. In addition, their house was given a HERS (Home Energy Rating System) score of 18 (since updated to 17!) — the lowest in the entire US (without renewable energy components).

In this episode, Rachel and Mike share their journey from learning about passive house, deciding to build one, finding the right people to do it, going through the experience of building it, and, now, how they want to (and have) use their home as a showcase for what's possible, helping to spread the word about passive house (a topic close to this podcast's heart).

Learn more about Clay Brook Passive House (CBPH):

• CBPH on Architect Hans Breaux's website => https://project.coop/clay-brook

• CBPH on Builder Maine Passive House's website => https://www.mainepassivehouse.com/gorham-passive-build

• CBPH on the Phius website => https://www.phius.org/certified-project-database/clay-brook-passive-house

• Passive House Accelerator article about CBPH => https://passivehouseaccelerator.com/articles/inside-the-first-phius-certified-single-family-home-in-new-hampshire

• Green & Healthy Maine Homes article about CBPH => https://greenmainehomes.com/blog/gorham-new-hampshire-passive-house

• Architect Hans Breaux on Marketing Passivhaus => https://marketingpassivhaus.com/episodes/hans-breaux-project-co-op

• Katrina Belle from Maine Passive House on Marketing Passivhaus => https://marketingpassivhaus.com/episodes/katrina-belle-maine-passive-house

Katrina Belle is the President and CEO of Maine Passive House. Her journey into building and passive house has its roots in a thesis she wrote on corporate social responsibility while studying human rights at College, coupled with the fact that most humans spend most of their lives inside buildings.

In this episode, we discuss the power of building science to improve people's baseline life experience, the benefits of having legislation that encourages building to better standards, the need to adjust your passive house talking points depending on who you're talking to, and much more.

Connect with Katrina and Maine Passive House:

• Katrina on LinkedIn => https://www.linkedin.com/in/katrina-belle-5216038b/

• Maine Passive House on LinkedIn => https://www.linkedin.com/company/maine-passive-house/

• Maine Passive House on Instagram => https://www.instagram.com/mainepassive/

• Maine Passive House website => https://www.mainepassivehouse.com/

• A great Passive House Accelerator article featuring a house built by Maine Passive House => https://passivehouseaccelerator.com/articles/inside-the-first-phius-certified-single-family-home-in-new-hampshire

Hans Breaux is an architect and the founder of Project CO+OP, a worker cooperative based out of Portland, Maine. Following Graduate School, Hans set off from his hometown in southern Louisiana to walk the Appalachian Way. He had no idea he would end up staying in Maine and founding his practice.

In this episode, we talk about the importance of talking to people, whenever and wherever, when it comes to spreading the word about Passivhaus, and Hans shares his view that Passivhaus is the "easy button" for creating buildings that use the most current best practices based on our sort of collective understanding of how to create shelter.

Connect with Hans and Project CO+OP:

• Hans on LinkedIn => https://www.linkedin.com/in/hans-breaux/

• Project CO+OP on LinkedIn => https://www.linkedin.com/company/project-co-op/

• Project CO+OP website => https://project.coop/

• A great Passive House Accelerator article featuring Hans => https://passivehouseaccelerator.com/articles/inside-the-first-phius-certified-single-family-home-in-new-hampshire