Category: high performance homes

What does it mean when a house is LEED certified? LEED stands for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design. It is an internationally recognized, third-party rating system for green building design – a standard we're very familiar with here at Clarum. The U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) is a non-profit organization committed to expanding sustainable building practices. The LEED certification program is the USGBC’s primary vehicle for promoting sustainable design and construction. The LEED system rates the environmental performance of a building. It is based on accepted energy and environmental...


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The cost of energy is rising rapidly – and not just in dollars. Our environment is paying the price as well: non-renewable energy consumption, carbon emissions, pollution, and inefficiency. All of these pressures make passive design a very timely and relevant notion. The Clarum approach to building passive and passive-inspired homes supports the health of our environment by consuming less energy, conserving non-renewable resources, and reducing our ecological footprint. Passive Homes Consume Less Passive homes represent today’s highest energy standard and can slash the energy consumption...


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Insulation improves energy efficiency Often clients come to us with a home that's already designed. They ask us to help them improve a home's air tightness and thermal envelope. One straightforward solution is adding insulation. Spray foam is an effective insulation because it forms an air barrier around your structure — sealing and insulating in one step. Once it is sealed, the air inside can be controlled by your heating and air unit. In this video, we show a traditionally-framed home. Instead of installing batted insulation, we chose a bio-based spray foam insulation. This insulation...


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  In this video, passive home experts John Suppes and Sean Misskelley discuss the Clarum Homes mission and vision of building comfortable high-performance passive homes. If you look at the average home, it's being built in the same way as homes were built 40 years ago. Nothing has really changed. In contrast, Clarum Homes is unique because we are continuously working to lead and innovate the way homes are built. Our entire team focuses on the following: sustainability in building materials thermal envelope so that the homes use less energy to heat and cool indoor air quality making...


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Clarum Homes Owner John Suppes and Director of Construction Sean Misskelley discuss building and living in passive homes. We build passive homes for their sound ethics, aesthetic beauty, internal comfort and interior air quality. A passive home is simply a building that employs a set of advanced building technologies to achieve extreme energy efficiency. Energy consumption is reduced by 90% or more compared to that of conventional homes. And these efficiency gains aren't due to some weird, boxy, ugly building design. Passive homes are elegant, comfortable living spaces with beauty that can rival...


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Sean Miskelley from Clarum Homes explains the use of SIPs (Structural Insulated Panels) in the Menlo Passive home. Structural insulated panels (SIPs) are high performance building panels used in the external envelope - floors, walls, and roofs for residential buildings. The SIPs panels are typically made by sandwiching a rigid core of foam plastic insulation between two structural skins of oriented strand board (OSB). They offer great air tightness and insulation with superior R values. The resulting home is extremely strong, energy efficient and cost effective. Building with SIPs will save...


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We finished up the construction of our Menlo Passive custom home a few weeks ago and just had our photographer come out to capture the home for us. Check out these beautiful photos – showcasing the exterior, the great room, kitchen, master suite and bathrooms. Menlo Passive proves that green can be gorgeous! Not only does Menlo Passive provide energy efficiency, comfort, health and durability, and up to 90% in energy savings coupled with construction techniques that exceeded the passive house air tightness standards by 65%, but it looks beautiful too. Passive house standards can be integrated...


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You are invited!  Please join us next week at one of our upcoming passive home events at Menlo Park and San Mateo County’s first passive home – Menlo Passive. We'll have expert passive house consultants to answer your questions about passive homes and show you how Clarum Homes is reinventing green building.     Passive House Consultants & Designers Tour Wednesday, June 1st 5pm – 8pm Menlo Passive Event includes refreshments and a passive house presentation.     Passive Home Event Thursday, June 2nd 12pm – 2pm Menlo Passive Event...


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First Certified Passive Home in San Mateo County & Menlo Park, California We are well under way on our first custom Passive Home in Menlo Park. The house is scheduled to be finished in late May. You may be wondering….what exactly is a passive house? A Passive Home is an extremely comfortable, healthy, economical and sustainable home, designed and constructed to use up to 90% less energy than a traditional home. This is achieved by enhanced insulation, greatly reduced thermal bridging, a virtually air tight building envelope, high performance windows and a heat recovery ventilation...


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