From the Construct Ireland archives

As Construct Ireland goes to press, the construction industry awaits Ministers Dick Roche and Noel Dempsey to sign off the long overdue timetable for implementing the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive, a piece of legislation set to make energy performance a key factor in property sales. But can Ireland train up enough auditors to label buildings by January 2006?

The Daintree Building is a mixed-use, sustainable urban building on Pleasant’s Place, just off Camden St. Dublin , writes Brian O’Brien of Solearth Architects. Conceived in 1999 it has been a long development process—but by late September Daintree should be open for business and the ever innovative Daintree (Paper Co) Ltd will have a new home, one appropriate to the delightfulness of their products and their focus on nature’s generosity for their raw materials.

The development of sustainable building in Ireland has had to wait for the public to become concerned about energy supply, climate change, and the implications of living in draughty, damp buildings.  Much of the established low energy know-how emanates from countries where cold winters drove innovation. Drawing from 50 years of research and development between the Canadian government and housing industry, the Super E programme may be just what Ireland needs, as John Hearne discovered at a new development in Rosslare.

There are surprisingly few truly iconic buildings, structures that dominate their environs, not to mention the country's intellectual landscape. Halla Chontae Chorcai, Cork County Hall, is one such building. Construct Ireland's Jason Walsh visited to find out about the building's environmental credentials.

Converting attic space can provide a relatively low cost means of increasing useable space, relative to the more arduous options of extending, or moving to a larger building. Duncan Stewart speaks to Construct Ireland about how best to approach Attic Conversions.

Lenny Antonelli takes a look at some of the entrants of the 2009 Solar Decathlon, a competition that challenges university teams from around the world to design and build homes that capture the sun’s energy.

An increasing number of sustainable homes are being built in Ireland but many of them are in rural areas, and yet, Ireland is an increasingly urban society. Jason Walsh looks at one recent attempt to renovate a small terraced house in inner-city Dublin, bringing it up to modern environmental and energy efficiency standards.

Box-like, small windows, primary colour renders - there is a common misconception that building to the passive house standard involves sacrificing design freedom for the sake of thermal performance. Not so, argues passive house guru Tomás O’Leary of MosArt and the Irish Passive House Academy, as his selection of architecturally diverse buildings reveals.

Upgrading and extending a semi-detached house on a tight site in Limerick required ingenuity from architect Patti O’Neill.

A new development at Grange Lough, Rosslare, reveals that passive houses can be made Irish – both in terms of what they’re built with, and how they look.