sonnen has partnered with Evolutionary Home Builders, Chicagoland’s premier sustainable home builder, and Brandon Weiss, healthy home building expert and PHIUS Passive House Certified Builder, to elevate sustainable building to a new level. The ‘Wildwood of Marengo’ community, founded on healthy and clean living, represents an innovation in home building standards that uses clean energy and sonnen ecoLinx energy automation technology as the centerpiece if its intelligent, energy positive homes – creating a first-of-its-kind energy positive sonnenCommunity.
The Wildwood of Marengo Development, the third U.S.-based sonnenCommunity project, is comprised of 28 passive homes that follow a conservation-first approach. Each passive home features a 6 kW solar array and a 20 kWh sonnen ecoLinx energy automation system and is built pursuant to the world’s most rigorous energy efficiency standards. The design, certified by Passive House Institute United States (PHIUS) in Chicago, maximizes energy gains, minimizes energy losses and performs at the highest level of building science.
By specifying the development to include sonnen ecoLinx energy automation systems, each residence uses smart home technology plus solar to produce, store and intelligently manage the home’s power throughout the day and night without sacrificing comfort. The homes are capable of becoming independent of the grid during high-cost periods of the day, avoiding the use of high carbon intensive peak power and minimizing stress on the utility grid.
“With the adoption of renewable energy gaining traction, and exponentially growing, it’s even more important to include intelligent energy storage in passive home design to eliminate negative impacts on the grid infrastructure and reduce the carbon emissions associated with utilizing peak power plants,” said Brandon Weiss. “By partnering with sonnen, Evolutionary Home Builders is ensuring its customers and new Wildwood homeowners can rely upon the most innovative smart home, renewable technology solution and approach – one that represents the home of the future, and the concept of ‘clean energy for all’.”
The Wildwood community represents a new standard in sustainable building that elevates comfort, quality and performance to create a community that is better for the environment and healthier for the occupants with homes that follow suit. In addition to the energy forward features, the development also includes 120 acres of wildlife and forestry – restored to its native state by Bluestem Ecological Services of Marengo, Illinois. Evolutionary Home Builders will initiate the development of the community with a completed Model Home opening in Summer 2019.
— Solar Builder magazine
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