What do Phius folks think about e.g. earthships, which greatly reduce energy costs while breaking many of these rules/guidelines? I'd love to see an in-depth analysis of earthships from a Phius perspective.
I'm not sure what Phius thinks of them but I personally came from a natural building background so can share some thoughts. I'm on the Phius Alliance Chicago board and I'm the one who creates and posts these videos. What I like about Phius versus earthships, cobb buildings, and other natural building approaches is the building science aspect where there are specific energy efficiency and other targets that are required to be met as well of verification that the energy targets were actually achieved. Also, while I am a huge fan of the natural building methods, they are often not possible in urban/suburban areas where following codes is required. I'd be really curious to see someone do that analysis too. I'll keep an eye out for anyone who's talking about it. Thanks for watching and commenting!
The Phius CORE and Phius ZERO standards do not specifically score projects for their embodied energy/Co2 in building products. Currently the standards address operational energy use and those performance characteristics that impact it the most: heating and cooling annual demands and peak loads. Phius recognizes that these are not the only important components of a comprehensive "sustainable" building effort, but it is a critical one and where they've focused their efforts. Detailed and reliable embodied energy/Co2 information about building materials is becoming increasingly available. There are a lot of talented dedicated people focused on this area and we expect standards will be developed around it. Phius will have the choice of building their own embodied energy/Co2 standard or encouraging/requiring compliance to another standard. My guess is it would be the latter. Either way it's an exciting area of exploration in the field and Phius will be a part of it.
