RISE

We’ve met many similarly impassioned people throughout this project. It started with bright eyed students and quickly gave way to ambitious professors, excited administrators, and generous sponsors. One of the friends we’ve made along the way is Dr Maria Saxton of Virginia Tech. She earned her Ph.D. in Environmental Design and Planning in the Building Construction Department and now guides communities and companies in developing better housing options. She also writes for Rise, an online homeowner’s resource for understanding how to incorporate sustainability into their home improvements. Maria and the team at Rise decided that ZeNETH would be a great story for other folks interested in the next generation of building, so she interviewed us!

“Project ZeNETH (zero-net-energy tiny home) started with a class at Western Washington University in Bellingham, Washington, that focused on carbon-neutral home design. The instructor tasked students with not only drawing the floor plans of an energy-efficient home but also with creating a full energy analysis of net-zero energy homes. Kellen Lynch, an undergraduate from the Fairhaven College of Interdisciplinary Studies and the Institute for Energy Studies at Western Washington University, asked himself, “What if we made this assignment real?””

You can find the full story here on Rise.

 

 

Spring Renewal

Happy Spring everyone!

Known as perhaps the most exciting but least productive quarter at the University, our team is hoping to take our work to the finish line of this academic year. We’ve noticed that when the sun comes out here in the PNW, people tend to forget their winter-selves a bit and lose track of everything they might have been doing. Before we run out to enjoy the budding blossoms and chirping chickadees, here’s what we’ve been up to:

  • Building a working relationship with local construction company and worker owned co-operative, A1 Design Build. A1 will be taking on the construction of our tiny house. (!!!) This is a major partnership and an incredible opportunity to work across our community with partners who believe in the same learning-by-doing idea that formed ZeNETH.
  • Presenting at the WWU TEDx Salon where Kellen will discuss ZeNETH and the need for actionable education within our schools. Kellen will also continue his work as a fellow for the IDEA Changemakers on Western’s campus.
  • Collaborating with Western’s Facilities Development and Capital Budget to design and implement our siting plan on the University’s campus
  • Envisioning all of the possible uses of the house while on campus, including its potential use as a recording studio or venue space for live performances and podcasts! The house will be a tour destination for many potential students, but also the thousands of students whose educations link to ZeNETH

Clearly, we have another full quarter ahead of us and we’re looking forward to every bit of it. Thanks for reading!

Fall Speaker Series


Good morning all,

We have been invited to be the inaugural speaker at Western’s Institute for Energy Studies’ Speaker Series. The series showcases various leaders and projects around the region and is designed as a class to inform and inspire students across all colleges of Western.

Our talk today will focus on how far we’ve come in the year since ZeNETH began, our project updates this fall, and then turn to what other students can do to act upon their own inspirations. We believe that ZeNETH can be just one of many student driven projects across Western that our community can learn from, and we know that starts with a simple spark from the students.

Come see us today, on campus, in the SMATE building SL130 at 4 pm.
Hope to see you there!

Western Front Part II


We are pleased to be featured in the Western Front at WWU for the second time this year. It feels validating and encouraging to have our work receive such attention, and we hope it furthers our case for bringing this project to life.
You can read the article in its entirety here:

http://www.westernfrontonline.com/2018/05/16/students-collaborating-to-build-first-student-led-tiny-house/

 

News Worthy

Breaking News: People Love Tiny Houses!

…oh, you knew that already? Well, even still, it seems like tiny homes excite all sorts of people and that momentum is only growing. Western is hungry for tiny homes!
In the past two weeks our team has been invited to three separate local media outlets to tell our story. Western Today started the momentum for us last week which was then picked up by the Spark Science podcast hosted by Western professor Regina Barber DeGraaff. Lastly, the Western Front, our student driven newspaper at the university sat down with our whole team and got the full scoop on ZeNETH.

We will post all the stories as they are published so stay tuned!

 

In other news…
We’ve been progressing fast on our house’s design and our design team is growing! In fact, all of our project’s teams are growing! Check out our Team page to read about our designers, policy specialists, outreach coordinators and what brought them to ZeNETH.
Lastly, we think it’s important to note our team’s design process. Lately, we’ve found it best to design net zero tiny homes with a pitcher of locally brewed beer from Aslan Brewing. We think that’s pretty standard.