Kit Elsworth
Username
Kit Elsworth
Proposer First Name
Kit
Proposer Email
kit.elsworth@gmail.com
Proposer Last Name
Elsworth
Proposer Company/Organization
KieranTimberlake
Proposer Phone
(215) 922-6600
Proposer Job Title
Associate, Building Performance Specialist
Boston 2023 Areas of Focus
Proposed Session Description
This case study of a prefabricated, all-electric, low-carbon residence in a cold climate demonstrates techniques for achieving scalable decarbonization, comfort, construction speed, and resiliency. The home is a product of a partnership between architect and builder that delivers a building with an embodied carbon footprint 80% below industry average and a Passive House level. The design process involved close collaboration with the client to ensure the home's design and systems met their expectations for comfort and resilience in an extreme, changing climate. The integrated design process between architect and builder, detailed analysis, and client engagement can serve as a model of best practices for home design.
Diversity and Inclusiveness
The case study home is produced in partnership between architect and builder with a goal of addressing supply chain equity and environmental justice. The integrated design team is actively researching labor supply chains and removing materials with connections to forced labor or poor land management. Also, the effects of the home’s construction and operation are studied through a lens of environmental justice, understanding the environmental effects to populations off-site. This presentation will highlight these issues but avoid a detailed summary as to focus on the decarbonization and prefabrication aspects of the project.
Learning Objectives
Provide an overview on the prefabrication process in addition to the lessons learned from assembly line to site assembly.
Learn strategies and techniques for radically reducing embodied carbon and minimizing operational carbon through electrification and a Passive House envelope.
Review a method of client engagement that translates occupant behavior and expectations to system performance and cost in a challenging climate with low carbon design goals.
Understand the cost and operational carbon tradeoffs between off-grid design and grid connectivity.
Has this session been presented before?
No
Session Format
Presentation followed by facilitated discussion or breakout groups
Session Format Details
Two 20 minute presentations followed by Q+A
Recommended Length
60-minute session
Strongest Content Connection - Boston 2023
Comments about your speaker roster
Kit Elsworth is an Associate and Building Performance Specialist at KieranTimberlake. As a member of the firm’s transdisciplinary research group, he focuses on building performance modeling and simulation primarily through the lens of occupant comfort and building energy demand.
Seth is inspired by the potential and power of design to transform the world and the way we live, work and learn. He operates at the intersection of the built environment and human collaboration to create the spatial conditions that foster creative innovation and change. In his 12 years as a registered architect, Seth's built work has spanned health-science education and research, residential life, historic renovation, collaborative workspace, cultural institutions and commercial enterprise.
Reviewer 1
Nielson, Christopher
Proposal #
128
Committee Decision
Rejected
Presenters
Full Description
This presentation is important because it addresses decarbonization and resilience through design and occupant engagement. It will demonstrate to other building professionals how designers and builders can collaborate to address decarbonization - both operational and embodied carbon. It demonstrates how prefabrication can lead to superior performance and expedited construction scheduling. Also, the challenge to ensure comfort and resilience due to the project’s location required careful analysis and education on the client’s behalf as it relates to renewable energy generation, storage, and cost. Attendees will be able to learn how project teams can translate occupant behavior to systems design while preserving the goal for a near zero carbon building.