Energy Consumption of an Energy Efficient Building Envelope in the Canadian Arctic

A demonstration house was built and commissioned in Iqaluit, Nunavut, Canada. The purpose of this work is to evaluate the energy consumption of the high performance building, while considering the unique social, economic, and logistical challenges for such a remote location. At 4.5 m by 5.4 m internal dimensions, the building has approximately 24 m(2) of floor area and is a 15 cm thick structural insulated panel (SIP) system with an R-value of 24 (RSI 4.23) at a panel mean temperature of 0 degrees C. A full year of monitoring has been conducted thus far, between April, 2016 and April, 2017. The cold climate required heating during all but a few hours of the year, with the outdoor ambient temperature ranging from -39 degrees C to +21 degrees C and a total of 9540 degrees C heating degree days for calendar year 2016. Daily heating energy consumption ranged from a peak of 30.4 kWh in the winter down to a minimum of 0.9 kWh for a small number of days during the summer when outdoor ambient temperatures neared 20 degrees C. The total heating electricity consumed for the period of April 25, 2016 to April 25, 2017, including electronics and lighting, was 4945 kWh. Based on the floor area, the building had an energy use intensity of 206 kWh per m(2).