MAINE PASSIVE PROJECT SURVEY - 2022

We are excited to announce our up-to-date passive house project survey map of Maine–and beyond! The map is based on information submitted by more than 25 passivhausMAINE members, and now provides information on buildings built or planned since 2019, the last time the map was previously updated. passivhausMAINE received information on 46 new projects, adding up to more than 1.7 million square feet of passive house construction. This is a huge leap forward from 2019 estimates, at which point there were roughly 60 buildings and only 400,000 square feet of passive house construction.

What accounts for this progress? Sustainable construction is not just becoming more popular, it is also getting bigger. While just over half of recent passive house buildings in Maine are still single-family homes, 20% were multifamily residential structures and nearly 25% were institutional or university buildings. On the larger end of the spectrum, Avesta Housing’s Porter Station Apartments are expected to open in spring 2023 with a total of 60 units. Meanwhile, the University of Southern Maine’s Portland Commons Residence Hall, also expected to open in spring 2023, will house 580 beds for a total of 218,000 square feet of passive house construction. Additionally, two buildings submitted for the 2022 map were retrofit projects, a trend that will hopefully grow in coming years.

The vast majority of projects built by passivhausMAINE members are in-state, but not all. In a nod to the growing popularity and influence of Maine’s sustainable building scene, new construction by Maine passive builders ranges as far north as Quebec and as far west as Michigan. A significant number of buildings that were built to passive house standards, including an air sealing level of .6ACH50, were not formally certified. This trend may suggest the need for other metrics for keeping track of sustainable construction, or easier and cheaper pathways towards passive house certification.

If you would like to learn more about passive house construction in Maine, check out the new data above. Recent projects display the square footage of a building, certificate of occupancy, various providers involved, and whether it is formally certified, whereas buildings submitted in 2019 generally include just location and square footage.

Thanks to everyone who submitted projects this year to help keep our map of passive house construction accurate. This information is crucial in order to create understanding and momentum around sustainable construction, as well as to incentivize funding and training programs in the future.