This building was awarded the Energy & Temperate Climates Prize at the national level of the Green Solutions Awards 2020-21; and received a mention for the same category at the international level.

Arroyo Fresno Passivhaus is the first nZEB collective residential building in Spain to obtain Passivhaus Plus certification. It is a project by Daniel Diedrich and Talia Dombriz of DMDV Arquitectos.

Located in the PAU of Arroyo Fresno in Madrid, it is configured with a simple prismatic volume containing 14 dwellings distributed over four floors above ground and resting on a porticoed ground floor and another floor below ground level. The floor plan is limited by the urban planning regulations establishing the limits of three of the visible facades. The remaining, smaller façade is adjacent to the neighboring building. Formally the building is conceived as a prism with great compactness, where the facade has the same finish in continuity only altered by the use of color, forming a zigzag band that runs between the order of window openings on each floor, seeking a formally clear singularity without altering the simplicity of the concept.

The building envelope has been optimized with the maximum criteria of the Passivhaus Institute (facades, floors and roofs, carpentry and glazing as well as solar protection) which reduces the building's heating demand to 14.40 kWh/(m2y) and cooling demand to 8.60 kWh/(m2y). The air infiltration test has been passed by Blower Door Test per housing unit and ground floor coworking space with a result of 0.58 1/h (n50), guaranteeing the airtightness of the volumes.

In addition, the air conditioning systems have been optimized with Daikin Alterma 3 aerothermal underfloor heating and cooling per dwelling unit (Heating capacity=4.6 kW. COOP=3.8) and a centralized domestic hot water system has been developed in the building consisting of a Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Q-Ton pump (heating capacity=30 kW. COOP=4.3) with two 3,000 liter DHW storage tanks. Furthermore, the ventilation system has been realized individually per living unit and coworking area, using Zehnder mechanical ventilation with heat recovery with an efficiency of 82%.

The renewable energy generation system is based on a rooftop photovoltaic system consisting of 61 Canadian Solar panels and Fronius DC/AC inverters with a total output of 32.97 kW/year.

Energy consumption

Primary energy need : -22,39 kWhpe/m2.year

Primary energy need for standard building : 62,00 kWhpe/m2.year

Final Energy : -2,42 kWhfe/m2.year

Breakdown for energy consumption :

Heating 6.55 kWh / m²year
Cooling 8.49 kWh / m²year
DHW 5.48 kWh / m²year

Envelope performance

Indicator : EN 13829 - n50 » (en 1/h-1)

Envelope U-Value : 0,20 W.m-2.K-1

Building Compactness Coefficient : 0,40

Air Tightness Value : 0,58

Find more details here.