Community Corner

The Shorewood Home With No Need for A Furnace

Jean Linn and her family will soon see construction start on their new "passive home," which is primarily heated by passive solar gain and by internal heat from people, instead of a furnace.

Jean Linn and her family will soon see construction start on their new Shorewood home, on a vacant lot at the corner of North Morris Boulevard and East Menlo Street, adjacent to 's entrance.

The new home will look a little different; in it won't blend with the houses lining the block and won't come equipped with a furnace. Instead, it will heated by body heat and sunlight.

Linn's new residence will be constructed as a “passive home."

Find out what's happening in Shorewoodwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

“It’s a new way of building that has come over from Germany,” Bruce Zahn, the architect hired to design the home, told the village’s Design Review Board. The panel approved its design Thursday.

While there are roughly 15,000 across Europe, there are only about a dozen in the U.S. certified as passive homes, according to a 2011 USAToday article. Zahn said he believes there are about 200 in the nation.

Find out what's happening in Shorewoodwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Linn and her family will give new life to the vacant lot. A house used to sit there, until a fire started in its basement in February 2011, flames quickly spreading throughout the house and shooting out of windows on every floor by the time firefighters arrived on the scene. It would take 40 firefighters to tame the flames, and left one of its occupants fighting for his life after sustaining serious burns.

The Linns have lived in Shorewood since 1984, her husband is a native and her children grew up in the village.

"As my children were leaving, we were looking for something more accessible," she said.

She knew she wanted to stay in Shorewood, but she wanted something different than the typical village home. She consulted with Zahn and they started looking into passive homes.

“We were looking for something that would suit our family, be efficient, sufficient and comfortable,” Linn said.

Passive homes cut energy consumption by 90 percent and are primarily heated by passive solar gain, internal gains from people and electrical equipment, according to the U.S. Passive House Institute.

“You're looking at 15 to 20 percent additional cost compared to a normal house ...  but there are benefits long-range that are far greater than what you would see immediately,” Zahn said.

Triple-insulated windows, super insulation, positioning in the landscape and an energy recovery ventilation system — which collects and stores the heat and restores the air, as opposed to recycling it — make the passive home work.

"It stores the heat and energy, but also doesn't let it leak out," Linn said.

In the Linns' case, their new home will be built with two-foot thick walls. Linn said as they were designing the home, they were able to plug designs into a computer program, which calculated what the energy loss would be and other details depending its layout.

The passive home differs from the passive solar homes, which are built with a lot of windows and positioned in such a way as to be heated by sunlight.

Zahn said it will be the first passive home he has ever worked on, and he’ll be taking some courses soon.

Linn's home will be constructed from conventional materials by her son Tim, Zahn said.


Get more local news delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for free Patch newsletters and alerts.

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here

More from Shorewood