It was hard to think of moving from the great energy-efficient solar house I had built nine years earlier in Burlington, VT, but I wanted to be closer to my daughter. Looking for housing in Brandon, I realized that I didn’t want to give up the bright warmth, open design and energy efficiency of my “old” house. The only answer was to build. Everything fell together, as I found a small lot with southern exposure in an established neighborhood, with houses close by on each side, and within walking distance of the center of Brandon. I visited my builder, Chuck Reiss’ new house on the Green Building Tour and got excited about new developments in the field and the possibility of reaching for net-zero. I immediately began designing, and Chuck agreed to bring his crew down to Brandon. Final plans were drawn up by Dora Coates of Dovecote Designs, with suggestions from my son-in-law, David Martin, who trained as an architect.

Much of the house design is carried over from my previous home. I had known from experience that Chuck’s building techniques (double walls with dense pack cellulose, careful sealing of all penetrations) would give me a tight envelope. The water-to-water geothermal heat pump greatly reduces the energy needed to heat the house and, as a bonus, gives me the comfort of radiant floor heat, as well as freedom from radiators. I keep the heat at a comfortable draft-free 67º. Based on the reduced heat load, solar hot water and energy efficient appliances, Chuck calculated the optimum amount of solar needed to reach net-zero.