Benedictine Boarding School Grows Greener With New Eco-Friendly Homes For Faculty Families

Blu ‘Evolution’ home exterior. Photo courtesy of Blu Homes.

The Portsmouth Abbey School is in the process expanding its living space, with the addition of two new eco-friendly designed homes for two of its faculty members and their families, as part of the school’s expanding green initiatives.

The two new homes are being built by Blu Homes, which designs and builds of upscale, eco-friendly manufactured homes, home additions, offices, and structures. 

The two-story Blu ‘Evolution’ style homes will be Energy Star-rated and LEED certified. All of the appliances will be Energy Star certified.

Blu ‘Evolution’ homes are very large and come in designs that include three-to-four bedrooms, one-to-two bathrooms, and special features like roof decks, high ceilings, large kitchens, and spacious floor plans.

Kitchen design in an ‘Evolution’ style home. Photo courtesy of Blu Homes.

“The Blu homes, in particular, are very desirable for our faculty. The space is just a great space to be living in. Our faculty are responsible for their own energy costs, so the energy efficiency of these is good for the two families that are going to be living here,” said James DeVecchi, headmaster of Portsmouth.

Blu homes’ energy saving features including high efficiency heating systems such as cost efficient tankless water heaters, radiant heat systems, and high efficiency heat pumps. These homes don’t come equipped with solar panels, but can be made solar-ready.

For cooling, the company provides the homes with options for green roofs, window shading, and ceiling fans, as well as positioning the homes for maximum natural air flow to help passively cool them. High efficiency air conditioning systems are also offered as an option.

Peter O’Commor, head of the humanities department at Portsmouth, who will be living in one of the homes, said, “Given the rise of fuel prices and on a teacher’s salary - a single income - this has a huge impact for me and where I can allocate my limited resources.

“We live in an old house with a rubble stone cellar, so every time it rains, it creates moisture problems inside the house and my wife has allergies, so the idea of a really tight house from the ground up is really, really fundamental for us.”

For the students, the school is also in the process of building a new boys’ green, energy efficient dormitory house that is slated for completion in 2012. 

The girls had the new St. Brigid’s House dormitory built for them in 2007. Its green construction features include: solar panels to provide domestic hot water; low-flow shower heads and toilets; energy recovery ventilators; and spray foam insulation.

In March 2006, Portsmouth also completed the installation of a mid-sized wind turbine on its campus. The school said, “As of March 31, 2007, one year to the day after the wind turbine began to operate, it generated nearly 1.3 million kWh of clean electricity and had supplied 39.35 percent of the school’s electrical energy usage.

“Total wind turbine revenues during its first year of operation were $222,710, including $64,661 in renewable energy credits, $28,496 in wholesale electricity sold back to the grid, and $129,553 in retail electricity displaced.”

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