Low Impacted Living Affordable Community

 Low Impacted Living Affordable Community [lilac] is located in Leeds England, and is a forerunner for the typology in the UK. It was started in 2006 with planning, and it took six years of development and planning to begin construction. This is typical of other projects like this that I have looked into. These ideologies are hard to swallow for more conservative policymakers.

The model of the houses built are "eco-built" in conjuncture with modular manufacturer ModCel who specializes in low carbon construction using premade timber home modules that are naturally insulated with straw. This passive system not only allows for sustainable natural thermal control, but its prebuilt and modular nature cuts down on emissions, site disturbance, erosion, and total project embodied energy in the construction process. The construction of the built environment is one of the industries that are a world leader in carbon emissions.

Another passive system employed to make the community sustainable is the Solar MVHR (mechanical ventilation heat recovery) power systems that largely contribute to thermal comfort of conditioned spaces in the project. The systems are designed to passively gain and store heat in the winters [heat sink] while repelling heat gain in the summer. Similar to a deciduous tree. These systems, which are employed on all residences, allow for stellar air ventilation and quality without the need for mechanical systems. Power also comes from a one and a quarter kilowatt solar system for each residence, and a four kilowatt solar system for the common house. Hot water is also yielded from solar gain.

The project, as all cohousing projects do, also relies on communal cooperation and sharing in order to both bring people together as well as contribute to the overall sustainable efforts of the community. Sustainable sharing comes in the encouragement of car sharing rather than owning individual vehicles. They also share gardening, maintenance, and pool equipment throughout all tenets. 

This project also follows the trend of almost all cohousing projects that I have looked at of growing organic food communally and harvesting and cooking them for community meals. This also promotes lots of communal engagement as well as contributing to the health of all tenets.

Of all the cohousing projects that I have looked at, this one particularly peaked my interest with my architecture background. All cohousing communities contribute to passive sustainable practices culturally, but this is the first one that I have seen that brags about its implementation of innovative architectural ideas in order to take realized sustainability to the next level.

Links to consider

https://www.lilac.coop/low-impact-living/

https://www.beamcentralsystems.com/blog/what-is-mvhr-and-how-does-it-work