Quote:
Originally Posted by Christ
DCB - instead of solely using rammed earth method, I may consider packing the holes in the blocks with earthen material, instead of using insulation... dirt is free, and mortar isn't, so backfillling the holes with mortar probably isn't the best idea... mud, on the other hand, should help with insulation and heating/cooling cycles more than normal insulation anyway.
|
I'm not so sure on that. If I were building a house, I'd be trying to incorporate every
passif-haus (passive house) idea I could. These are super insulated houses (and definitely not mud), with extremely low infiltration rates, minimized thermal bridging and super high efficiency energy recovery ventilation systems. Combined with topnotch but very expensive fenestration that we can't just go and buy in the window section at Home Depot, the Europeans are finding they can heat a house by internal loads only anywhere south of Scandanavia.