Why a Tire-House?

Why a Tire-House ?

Renovating a two story attached-house in Ottawa, we quickly realized how inefficient and wasteful modern housing is. Having seen various concepts on HGTVs 'Extreme Green Homes', we set out to design and build a home utilizing our favorite concepts; Passive Solar, Thermal Mass, Greywater Irrigation & Natural Ventilation. Basically, it's heated by the sun, its temperature regulated by mass which absorbs excess heat during the day and releases it at night, diverts 80% of used water into an indoor greenhouse and is ventilated naturally to remove humidity.

example of an incomplete tire-wall and roof/window framing 

Passive Solar
(from wikipedia) In passive solar building design, windows, walls, and floors are made to collect, store, and distribute solar energy in the form of heat in the winter and reject solar heat in the summer. This is called passive solar design or climatic design because, unlike active solar heating systems, it doesn't involve the use of mechanical and electrical devices.

Thermal Mass
(from wikipedia) Thermal mass is a concept in building design that describes how the mass of the building provides "inertia" against temperature fluctuations, sometimes known as the thermal flywheel effect.


Greywater collection and irrigation
(from wikipedia) Greywater is wastewater generated from domestic activities such as laundry, dishwashing, and bathing, which can be recycled on-site for uses such as landscape irrigation.

Our house will feature approximately 350 square feet of rubber lined indoor planters, growing anything from bananas to blueberries and diverting anywhere between 45-90 gallons of water away from our septic system every day. A diverter valve will allow toxic greywater to bypass indoor planters and be sent directly to a traditional septic system.

Natural Ventilation & Stack Effect
(from wikipedia) Natural ventilation is the process of supplying and removing air through an indoor space without using mechanical systems. It refers to the flow of external air to an indoor space as a result of pressure or temperature differences.