Jan Juc Autonomous House

Design Philosophy

The Jan Juc autonomous house was sighted where a gum tree had blown over to reveal good access to sunlight in an otherwise very dense and dark canopy. This helped minimize site disturbance.

The small footprint of the building was designed to weave between the trees that evolved along a well worn wallaby track.

The client’s brief together with the site constraints called for an autonomous building that harvests its own power and water and treats its own waste on site.

Sustainable Design Elements

• Passive solar design- all habitable rooms have access to articulated north facing windows for heat gain as well as southern windows for cross ventilation
• Thermal mass in ground floor concrete slab with insulated edges and integrated hydronic heating
• Thermal mass and insulation in Straw bale walls rendered with natural locally sourced mud with low cement content
• Recycled local timber poles support the roofs and upper floor structure
• Radially sawn weatherboards cut to minimize waste and detailed to resist bushfire attack
• Solar hot water integrated with hydronic heating and boosted by 25kw wood fired stove boiler, cook top and two ovens
• Rainwater harvesting in 25,000L water tanks
• Hand made taps and showerheads using standard copper and brass fittings with flow restrictors
• All black and grey water is processed through a worm farm which irrigates the fruit trees and vegetables
• Renewable energy through stand-alone 8kw solar photovoltaic array and battery store with bio diesel generator as emergency back up
• LED lighting where possible with compact fluorescent where not
• High performance thermal insulation and double glazing