Passive House on Tour 2025 started on 21 February with a visit to Paderborn
The focus is on insulation, refurbishment, built projects … from Aachen to Detmold.
After an ‘insulation workshop’ in Paderborn in the morning, the renovation and modernisation of a single-family house into a multi-family house to passive house premium standard was visited in Detmold in the afternoon.
Passive house pioneer Bernd Steinmüller gave an introduction and reported on project experiences from 50 years of scientific and practical experience.
Energy-efficient refurbishment
Energy efficiency is a ‘game changer’ for the energy transition. It has therefore been the focus of many passive house conferences. The next International Passive House Conference will take place on 24 and 25 April 2026 at the Haus der Technik in Essen. Motto: Into the transformation with energy efficiency!
In 2022, the Passive House Institute PHI launched the international campaign ‘Energy Efficiency Now!’ under the seal of a 70-year-old residential building (see campaign image, street side) that had undergone exemplary refurbishment by BSMC. Information on the campaign can be found in Passipedia, International Press Release; see below for information on the award-winning Plus house.
*Renovate, but do it right!** was the motto of the last Passive House Conference 2024. In Session 2 Passive House and Sustainability, B. Steinmüller reported on 15 years of experience and measurement results in non-residential construction, in Session 12 on ‘Energy Efficiency’ and ‘Mini-Split Heat Pumps’ (together with J. Schnieders, see sources).
Passive House Award for BSMC
Prize: B. Steinmüller was awarded the PASSIVE HOUSE AWARD and the NRW Special Prize in 2021 for the Passive House Plus renovation of the above residential building (see prize photo, east side of garden). In the laudation it says: “Through the gentle handling of the building fabric, he has managed in a special way to preserve the character of the building and its surroundings. In addition, he has shown that the passive house standard can be implemented with reduced technology, sustainably and economically.” Thanks are also due to the architectural firm Wispler from Paderborn, which made the renovation a success with commitment and expertise. See also Poster-Hamm, Press Release, finalists, Interview with CSM-Alumnus Bernd Steinmüller in German , as well as following article “Fit for the future”.
In 2012, B. Steinmüller was awarded the international PASSIVE HOUSE PIONEER AWARD (Youtube, Recording International Passive House Conference 2012, German) … for pioneering work in the 1970s (see also Passipedia-Historical-Review).
Bernd Steinmüller Explains Sustainable Building Energy Concepts
In the special issue “Building Concepts” of the magazine Gebäudeenergieberater 07-2021 (German), Passive House pioneer Dr. Bernd Steinmüller explains under the title “Fit for the Future – Sustainable Energy Turnaround in Existing Buildings” how Passive Houses-Plus differ from mere “Plus-Energy-Buildings”.
He uses the built example to illustrate how the Passive House Plus concept can be implemented in an ecologically, economically and socially sustainable way even in existing buildings, how building owners, tenants, climate benefit, how renewable energies are efficiently used and how building resilience is increased (see also Interview with CSM alumnus Bernd Steinmüller in German).
More than 5 years of measurement data show that the concept works not only in theory, but also in renovation practice with high accuracy and is a key to sustainable buildings and independence from fossil energy. (Cf. also measurement data in English Poster-Hamm)
International Passive House Conference 2021
In September 2021, the 25th International Passive House Conference “Key to Sustainable Building” took place with numerous expert lectures, trade exhibition, competition for energy-efficient buildings, excursions and workshops – largely “virtual” due to COVID.
BSMC was one of the active supporters with Bernd Steinmüller on the conference advisory board and two lectures as well as two competition entries (Poster Awarded Passive-House-Plus Hamm, Passive-House-Plus-Poster-Aachen). The lecture Modernisation to Passive House Plus/Premium Standard (15 min, in German with English Subtitles) demonstrates by means of a current example how the energy demand can be massively reduced even in existing buildings, how the use of renewables can be massively increased, and that Passive House standards show the way forward here, while previous legal norms and subsidy standards are misleading and therefore need to be greatly improved. The lecture on dark droughts (13 min, in German with English subtitles) underlines that passive house technology is indispensable for sustainably tackling the supply problem and that it offers a “double dividend” in winter, which is more important today than ever before.