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Designed by Steve Mouzon
Silver Spring, Maryland

Katrina Cottage VIII is the greenest Katrina Cottage built to date. Depending on how it is sited and where it is located relative to where it is manufactured, it may achieve either a LEED-NC Gold or LEED-NC Platinum rating. Here are some of the reasons why... and some of the cool new green things that it does that LEED doesn't even take into account... yet.

Lovability

Today, there is a growing realization in some parts of the green community that being green is bigger than just being cleverly engineered. In the 1970's, huge numbers of American homes were equipped with rooftop solar panels... which were then ripped off in almost equally large numbers even though they were still saving money precisely because their appearance was totally unlovable. We make a mockery of the term "sustainable" if we build things that will be demolished and taken to the landfill in a decade or two because the humans cannot love them. So the first responsibility of any building that hopes to be sustainable is to be designed in such a manner that it can be loved. This means that it must take into account the things that people have valued the most and loved the longest in the region where it is built. That was the starting point of Katrina Cottage VIII: the architecture of the Most-Loved Places of the Washington area.

Expandability

Katrina Cottage VIII is the first Kernel Cottage to be built. Expandability is the foundation of a Kernel Cottage design. Just like a kernel, or seed, it can grow if needed. Katrina Cottage VIII has four Grow Zones; the house can grow in two directions (Sprouting Spots) from each Grow Zone. One Sprouting Spot has been used for the bathroom, leaving a total of seven Sprouting Spots available. In each one, a window becomes a door, allowing access to the addition or porch. How is expandability green? It is green for at least two reasons. First, when a family outgrows a house today, they often buy a new one, and most new construction eats up farmland on the fringes of cities and towns in ways that usually require driving a car to all the necessities of life. Second, if they could buy a smaller house in the beginning with full confidence that the house can grow easily when their family does (Kernel Cottages make that obvious,) then they may grow to love the Smaller & Smarter lifestyle so much that future additions are Smaller & Smarter, too, conserving resources when they are built and energy costs from that point forward.

Reduced Footprint

Because this cottage lives like a much larger house due to its space-efficient features, its actual footprint is significantly smaller than that of any conventional house that would replace its functionality. This helps reduce the overall site disturbance and assists in stormwater management. It also requires less energy to heat and cool the smaller footprint, even if the house were no more efficient than ordinary houses... but it is more efficient, as detailed below.

Narrow Footprint

Most of the Katrina Cottages have a narrow footprint, and this one is no exception. Houses with narrow footprints are able to sit on more compact streetscapes such as those found in traditional neighborhoods. Compact neighborhoods can be more walkable because there are more destinations within walking distance, and compact, walkable neighborhoods are much easier to serve with neighborhood retail like the corner grocery, etc., meaning that you aren't forced to drive as much. And compact, walkable, mixed-use neighborhoods are candidates for future transit service, like a streetcar, light rail, or bus liine.

LEED Accredited Professional

Katrina Cottage VIII was designed by Steve Mouzon, who is a LEED Accredited Professional.

Reflective Roofing

This cottage is roofed in 5V metal roofing, which has a reflectance as high as any roofing available. This has two primary benefits: it reduces the site's heat island, and it also significantly reduces cooling expenses in the summer. There is a third benefit of metal roofing, which is that Galvalume roofing easily lasts for a century or more if not exposed to salty coastal air. So during the time conventional petroleum-based asphalt shingles have wasted more energy and successive generations of them have been hauled to the dump five or six times, the same 5V metal roofing is still sitting there, doing its job reflecting the summer heat.

Cross-Ventilation

Windows are placed directly across the cottage from each other, ensuring excellent cross-ventilation. All windows are operable, giving the resident full control of natural ventilation.

Ventilating Windows

All windows are true double-hung, so you can lower the top sash and raise the bottom sash on summer evenings to allow warm air near the ceiling to escape while cooler outside air flows in at the bottom.

Daylighting

Windows occupy as high a percentage of the exterior wall of the cottage as could be arranged without sacrificing the wall's insulation properties, providing a high degree of daylighting. And it's not just the quantity of light, but its character, that counts. Daylight is provided on not one or two, but three sides of primary living spaces. This creates light that is unusually soft and beautiful.

Insulation

Walls are 6" thick, with R-19 insulation. The attic is insulated with R-38 batts.

Construction Waste Management

Katrina Cottage VIII was built in a factory. While working drawings are available to allow the cottage to be built conventionally on-site, manufactured cottages reduce construction waste dramatically due to the efficiencies of building in a factory.

Recycled Building Materials

Katrina Cottages can be built using many delivery methods and building materials. Katrina Cottage VIII was built of lightgauge steel framing; a substantial percentage of the steel was recycled.

Regional Building Materials

One of the foundation principles of Katrina Cottages is that they should be appropriate to the architecture of the region in which they are installed. House designs that are not regionally based tempt the manufacturers to try to ship them all over the country, but regionally-based designs clearly are best manufactured in the region where they are intended to be sold.

Rapidly Renewable Materials

The flooring in Katrina Cottage VIII is solid bamboo.

Low-Emission Materials

Materials in Katrina Cottage VIII were selected for their low emissions. In many cases, such as the solid slate flooring and the solid ceramic tile in the bathroom, the emissions are zero. And speaking of solid, everything in the entire cottage is solid. There are no veneers anywhere for two reasons: First, veneers are not nearly as patchable as solid components (see Patchable Materials below,) and veneers require glues. Glues are one more item that can put off noxious gases; why not avoid them? Katrina Cottage VIII does.

Patchable Materials

Many materials sold today on the promise of being "no maintenance" only fulfill that promise if the building will be bulldozed in 12-15 years. Vinyl siding is a classic example: if the charcoal grill gets too close in a few years or the dog decides to gnaw on a piece of it, you cannot replace just the damaged area because the new vinyl doesn't match the old vinyl that has been weathering for years. So you are forced to replace the vinyl on the entire wall, if not the entire house. In short, when most "no maintenance" materials fail, they fail catastrophically, requiring the entire assembly to be removed and carted off to the landfill. The materials in Katrina Cottages make no claim at being "no maintenance;" their claim instead is that they are maintainable and patchable. This means that they are likely to be still doing their job a century or more after "no maintenance" materials are at the bottom of a landfill.

Wind Chill Factor

Anyone who has felt a sudden breeze on a hot summer day understands that air moving across your skin makes you more comfortable. As a matter of fact, people can be comfortable with air that is 10° warmer or more if there is a breeze. Because of this "Breeze Effect," ceiling fans have been installed in every room where people spend significant amounts of time. Ceiling fans consume only a few watts, while an air conditioner consumes thousands.

Heating & Cooling Equipment

This cottage is heated and cooled with a high-efficiency dual-fuel (gas & electric) split system which uses a next-generation refrigerant that does not contribute to ozone depletion.

Water Heater

The water heater is an instantaneous model, which has several benefits. First, it never runs out of hot water because it heats the water as it flows through, meaning that you can have endless hot showers if you wish. That sounds totally non-green, but even though it provides all the hot water you could ever want, it still uses only about half of the electricity of a conventional water heater because there is no hot water tank to be heating all the time. And it takes up very little space... not much more than a business telephone.

Exterior Lighting

This cottage's exterior lighting is all of the downlighting sconce variety, and all of it is located on the front porch, which means that it will not be thrown directly up into the night sky, contributing to light pollution.

Carbon Dioxide Monitoring

Katrina Cottage VIII is equipped with a carbon dioxide monitor to enhance the health and safety of the occupants.

Bed Curtains

The old canopy beds were not invented just to be beautiful; they had a very specific job to do, which was to keep the occupants of the bed warm even when the temperature of the rest of the house dropped very low on winter nights. Katrina Cottage VIII does exactly the same thing, with beds curtained with thick lined linen curtains that provide both privacy and warmth. One additional note on privacy: while parents might find it perfectly normal to sleep in curtained alcoves of the same room with very young children, there is no doubt that this arrangement does not work for most Americans when the kids approach their teen years. Adding a bedroom wing is essential at this point, but Kernel Houses expand very easily through Sprouting Spots in their Grow Zones (see Expandability above.)