John Street, Social Housing

Project details:

John Street is a Passivhaus social housing scheme for the London Borough of Newham, built in response to their Climate Emergency Action Plan, which mandates building of council owned housing to the Passivhaus Standard (see also Hathaway Crescent, Vandome Close and Leyes Road). The project comprises a development of 70 local authority homes in three blocks: an 11 storey apartment block; a terrace of three storey town houses and a three storey apartment block. The larger building will be concrete frame with light gauge steel (SFS) infill, the smaller buildings, which require full fill cavities to meet Passivhaus, will be concrete frame with masonry infill.

Delta Q were appointed Passivhaus Consultants to support the design and construction of the Passivhaus social housing by main contractor, Higgins Partnerships. Delta Q undertook numerous 2D and 3D thermal bridge models to inform the design.

Roof mounted air source heat pumps will provide heating via tempered supply air as well as domestic hot water. Cooling will be provided to ground floor flats in the largest block where security limits the ability to leave windows open at night. Ventilation is provided to all apartments via a mechanical ventilation with heat recovery (MVHR) unit in each dwelling.

Construction of the ground floor began in January 2024. Delta Q have been working with the Higgins site team and sub-contractors since September 2023, developing a site evidence register, benchmarking installation of below ground insulation and supporting systems for evidence collection and recording.