| 109 T T Hugh de Lacy Demand growing for passive design Passive houses are ultra-low-energy buildings that minimise the carbon footprint and require less energy for heating and cooling. Caldwell & Highsted BUILDING High-performance and passive homes in particular are driving the new-home market for Dunedin builders Caldwell and Highsted, although traditional timber-framed buildings – and a raft of renovation jobs – continue to be asked for. With a staff of 11, which has grown by six since the beginning of the year, Caldwell and Highsted owner and general manager Taylor Clark is making a specialty of building homes with a high-performance capacity. “There are a couple of types of panels on the market, which combine both insulation and structural elements into a single board, and more and more of our clients are becoming aware of them and their advantages,” Taylor says. “One we use is called SIP Panel, which is structurally insulated with the polystyrene insulation compressed between wooden surfaces, and there are several manufacturers of it in the South Island. “On the normal timber-framed homes we use a membrane, Intello, made by Pro Clima, to provide the air-tightness envelope with the higher R-value insulation used.” Passive houses are ultra-low-energy buildings that minimise the carbon footprint and require less energy for heating and cooling. They began to appear in increasing numbers world-wide from the turn of the millennium, driven by the German notion of passivhaus developed by Sweden’s Bo Adamson and Germany’s Wolfgang Feist in the late 1980s, delivering air-tightness and thermal comfort. Most of the passive house uptake has been in Germany and Scandinavia, but the advantages of the design have been widely recognised in New Zealand, and this is being expressed increasingly in Caldwell and Highsted’s workload. “It’s at the sharp end of modern house design and it’s benefitted from the awareness of the contribution of the construction industries to global warming,” Taylor says. The company was founded in 2016 by Paul Caldwell and Julian Highsted, who both had backgrounds in the construction industry, though both have since left the company. Taylor did his building apprenticeship with the company, coming out of his time in 2019 and buying the business from the founders while keeping the name. “We build several houses a year, passive and otherwise, but we also take on renovations and additions – in fact any building jobs,” Taylor says. “We’re blessed in having a really strong workforce, who are committed to making any build go as smoothly as possible for the client. “Our biggest goal is to provide a finished job that the client is stoked with, delivered by people who really have the clients’ interests at heart, and who realise that just being well-mannered reduces the stress for them. “As a result we’re getting a lot of repeat clients, along with people who have heard about us by word of mouth.” Having grown the staff significantly this year, Taylor is happy to keep the business at about the level that it is. “I’m happy doing what we’re doing at the moment, and I’m not particularly aiming at expanding the company. “That said, market demand is growing and we definitely want to be part of that.” Caldwell&Highsted Proud to Support • Pre-purchase electrical inspections / reports • House re-wires and alterations • Switchboard upgrades • New Builds • Lighting, kitchens, bathrooms info@chromeelectrical.co.nz | 027 653 7310 | www.chromeelectrical.co.nz Proud to support Caldwell & Highsted Specialising in • PAINTING • WALLPAPERING • SPRAY PAINTING • TEXTURE COATING Proudly supporting Caldwell & Highsted
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