With Nods to History, 'New American Home' Pushes Forward in Design

Other notable details include a four-foot door in the master suite that has two purposes. In one position it closes off the bedroom from the bathroom; in the other, it closes the toilet compartment. The master bathroom soaking tub area has two windows. One is a conventional opening, the other a flowing "water wall."

The look and layout are so different that most visitors will not focus on any other aspects, but this house makes an equally bold statement in its construction, energy efficiency and stormwater management.

As a demonstration project, the entire building frame is made of precast concrete panels, rather than the wood stud and concrete block construction that is nearly universal in the area. For Central Florida, concrete has distinct advantages, Jim Niehoff of the Portland Cement Association said in an e-mail. Concrete's impact resistance is a plus in this hurricane and tornado zone. Unbeknownst to non-Floridians, the state gets more tornadoes than any other, though they are generally less severe than those in the Midwest.

Concrete is impervious to termites, always an issue in Florida's semitropical climate.

Concrete wall panels that are cast with insulation, as is the case here, are also energy savers. And because concrete pieces fit together more precisely than conventional wood framing, this house does not have air leaks and drafts. It's so airtight, in fact, that fresh air must be brought in mechanically.

The windows are another energy-saving feature. In addition to their low e-coating, they have a low solar heat gain rating, which significantly reduces the amount of heat coming in through the windows in the hot season, said John Broniek, an energy consultant with the IBACOS firm in Pittsburgh, who built an energy model of the house and forecast its energy use.

Photovoltaic panels that occupy about a third of the roof area convert solar energy into electricity, providing about 16 percent of the household's electricity needs.

Combining the energy savings obtained from the insulated, precast concrete panels, the windows, the photovoltaic panels on the roof and an unusually efficient heating and air-conditioning system, the house is 49 percent more energy-efficient than a house of the same size built to the standard building code in Orlando, Broniek said.

The stormwater management in this house is elaborate and effective -- about 95 percent of the rainwater will be contained on the site, compared with only 10 to 15 percent for the other houses in the neighborhood, said Mike Hardin of the Stormwater Management Academy at the University of Central Florida in Orlando. Of the 50 inches of rain that will fall onto the house and its tiny yard each year, only about 2.5 inches will end up in the city storm sewer system. The rest will be collected and recirculated.

All the rain that hits the house is channeled to the planter boxes. These are lined up so that the water that collects in each box is filtered and dripped onto the box below. When the water eventually reaches the ground, it is pumped into a 7,000-gallon cistern under the detached garage.

From there, the water is pumped back to the roof twice a week to irrigate the planter boxes, insuring that they are regularly watered without using the municipal drinking water.

This rainwater system has additional advantages for land developers. If each house in a new development could contain its stormwater runoff, less land would be needed for stormwater-retention ponds, and more building lots could be sold, Hardin said. "In areas with high land costs, this system would be a no-brainer."

Katherine Salant can be contacted via her Web site, www.katherinesalant.com.

© 2007, Katherine Salant, Distributed by Inman News Features