Proud Green Home of St. Louis relies on advanced framing

The Proud Green Home of St. Louis employs a number of green building techniques and products with the goal of creating a high-performance home for the family that will live in it.

Building Envelope: ZIP System Panels & Advanced Framing

By: Matt Belcher, Verdatek Solutions

While system components such as the HVAC will likely be upgraded in the future with technology advances, it makes sense to invest in building a better thermal envelope by taking more time to design and examine the finer details, and utilizing advanced materials and methods. Knowing that sustainability is as much about controlling costs and protecting future equity position for our homeowners, we placed a lot of emphasis in building an outstanding high performance system with the sheathing and framing because these are the bones of the home that will be in place for decades to come.

We chose the 7/16” ZIP System roof and wall sheathing from Huber and advanced framing techniques for the Proud Green Home project. Together these building systems offer a more durable, efficient building envelope than traditional framing and sheathing techniques.

ZIP System

Subcontractors installing the framing and Huber ZIP system on Proud Green Home St. Louis. Photo Credit: Times 3 Photography

The home’s ZIP System creates a thermal envelope comprised of continuous, insulated panels sized from architect Curtiss Byrne’s plans. The panels were manufactured off-site from engineered, oriented strand board layered with a highly efficient insulating foam in the center. These continuous panels reduce the amount of seams in the thermal envelope to create a better barrier against air and moisture exchange. The ZIP System also meets the requirements for several green building codes, including the NGBS ICC-700 standards we are verifying Proud Green Home St. Louis through.

Similar to the modeling kits you may have used as a kid, once built the panels needed to frame the home were shipped to the site and fastened to the frame of the home by our subcontractors. The panels were then taped together using a specially constructed, permanent adhering tape to further reduce thermal bridging.

Advanced Framing Techniques

Also known as Optimal Value Engineering, we used advanced framing techniques in Proud Green Home St. Louis to optimize the home’s energy efficiency and reduce waste and lumber costs.

With advanced framing techniques unnecessary framing redundancies are eliminated without compromising the structural and architectural integrity of the home while still surpassing building codes, more room is available for insulation. We used raised heel, or energy, trusses in the home’s construction. Energy trusses are oversized and increase the height on exterior walls, allowing more room for insulation on the outside of the home.

The combination of advanced framing and ZIP systems we used in the Proud Green Home were carefully planned to work together to reduce thermal exchange and increase the home’s energy efficient performance. They are but one aspect of the whole house design, or holistic systems, approach to building that we are using to ensure higher performance in this home.

Read more about the Proud Green Home of St. Louis.