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Figure 6: Life cycle energy of different building standards.
4. One year Minergie-A experience
4.1 General
During the first 16 months in which the Minergie-A standard has been available, 7
certified buildings have been built and 107 buildings are pre-certified. Currently, an
additional 46 buildings which are in the planning phase are aimed to meet the standards
criteria.
The requirement for embodied energy is not only being accepted, it is actually being
honoured by the architects and designers as a new challenge in optimization. The
embodied energy calculations show that the limit value is well chosen. It is not too
onerous, i.e. it does not pose an insurmountable problem and thus a reason to skip
Minergie-A. But it is sufficiently strict to force planners to make an effort to reach the limit.
The additional work necessary for the calculation is not much criticized.
In general, the feedback of architects and designers is very good. They appreciate it that
there is a label with a net zero energy balance including a limit for embodied energy.
There has been an increase in enquiries about the availability of a Minergie-A standard
for office buildings. This standard is under development, now. Some of the architects
and designers would like to do more: e.g. a Net ZEB or include a requirement for mobility.
4.2 Use of solar energy
The use of solar energy is obligatory for Minergie-A buildings (fig. 7). Thermal solar
collectors reduce the energy demand for heating and hot water. The electricity from
photovoltaic systems substitutes the electricity to run the HAVC. A common energy
concept is a very well insulated building envelope, a heat pump for heating and hot water
and a photovoltaic system for on-site renewable energy generation. With a share of
approximately 75 %, heat pumps are the main type heating system used.
In general, the generation system must be installed on-site. A special case in this regard
is a small Minergie-A cluster of 68 single family terraced houses and 5 apartment
buildings. As the apartment buildings could not fulfil the net zero energy balance on their
own, they were allowed to use the surplus of the single family houses for their balance.
With this, Minergie-A can be viewed to be taking the step from a building related net zero
energy balance to a cluster related net zero energy balance. As the cluster only consists
of four building types only one example of each building type is considered in the
analysis in chapter 2.
