Sustainability
Passivhaus building services design
Building services design for Passivhaus certification, including PHPP input, ventilation strategy and the low-load plant selection it requires.
- Discipline
- Sustainability
WHAT IT IS
Passivhaus is a performance standard verified by calculation in the Passivhaus Planning Package and by measured airtightness on site. For building services, it changes the problem rather than removing it: heating loads become very small, which makes conventional plant selection and control difficult, and ventilation with heat recovery becomes the primary system rather than a secondary one.
The standard is described as building-type agnostic, but its thresholds and default assumptions derive from dwellings in a heating-dominated climate. Applying it to a non-residential building — a school, a hotel, a leisure centre — relocates the difficulty into boundary condition definition and services integration rather than building physics.
WHEN YOU NEED IT
From Stage 1. Passivhaus is not a specification that can be applied to a design later; the form, fabric, glazing and services strategy have to be developed against the PHPP from the outset.
DELIVERABLES
What you receive
- Services input to the PHPP model
- MVHR system design and duct sizing
- Low-load heating strategy and plant selection
- Summer comfort and overheating assessment
- Airtightness strategy input and services penetration detailing
STANDARDS
Standards applied
The editions in force at the time of design. Where a standard is amended mid-project we confirm which edition the appointment is based on.
- PHPPPassivhaus Planning Package — Passivhaus InstitutPassivhaus Institut
- Passivhaus Certification CriteriaPassivhaus InstitutPassivhaus Institut
- CIBSE TM52Avoiding overheating in European buildingsCIBSE
- BS EN 16798-1:2019Indoor environmental input parametersBSI
QUESTIONS
Common questions
What does Passivhaus require of building services?
Passivhaus requires mechanical ventilation with high efficiency heat recovery, very low heating demand met by correspondingly small plant, minimal distribution losses, and services penetrations detailed so the airtightness target can be achieved. The certification criteria are verified through the Passivhaus Planning Package.
Can Passivhaus be applied to non-residential buildings?
Yes, and it is certified on schools, offices, leisure and hospitality buildings. The building physics transfers largely intact. The difficulty moves to defining boundary conditions — occupancy, internal gains and use patterns that the residential defaults do not describe — and to integrating services at loads far below what conventional plant is designed to modulate to.