Marlene Imirzian & Associates Architects

HomeNZ is a competition-winning design that?s all about insulation The fifth largest city in the U.S. bound by a hot and arid desert, Phoenix, Arizona, has been working hard to become a leader in sustainable development.
In 2016, the city laid out an ambitious goal to become carbon neutral and waste free by 2050. One outgrowth of that pledge was a competition led by the American Institute of Architects? Arizona chapter, which asked local design shops to create blueprints for a net-zero home that anyone could use free of cost.
Now, the winner of the competition, Marlene Imirzian & Associates Architects, is making good on that promise and offering up plans for its sustainable home design for free. Imirzian?s 2,100-square-foot HomeNZ is a modern three-bedroom house with an impressively low energy rating. The competition required all submissions to have a Home Energy Rating System score (HERS) of 30 or less (the lower the better, and the average home clocks in at 100 HERS). HomeNZ?s score is zero.

Marlene Imirzian & Associates Architects

So how did the designers mitigate energy usage under Phoenix?s hot and sunny conditions" It?s all about insulation. The architects started with the building envelope, which creates a continuous barrier to bolster insulation, prevent air leaks, and reduce energy usage. ?[The] walls and roof insulation and underslab is really a continuous volume approach,? I...