Zero Emission Affordable Housing Design: Palm City Village
National Community Renaissance
Recipient
Rancho Cucamonga, CA
Recipient Location
29th
Senate District
50th
Assembly District
$926,637
Amount Spent
Completed
Project Status
Project Result
National Community Renaissance of California, in collaboration with Studio-E Architects, Arup US, Inc., Momentum, and the University of Southern California, has developed a design for the Palm City Transit Village—a new, mixed-use, fully affordable, all-electric community in San Diego aimed at revolutionizing housing in the face of California's climate and housing challenges. Featuring 288 units, the project integrates cutting-edge, low-carbon technologies and advanced materials to advance building decarbonization and accelerate progress in the state's housing sector. It focuses on validating the performance and cost-effectiveness of these technologies to spur market shifts and expedite widespread adoption. The initiative also emphasizes knowledge dissemination to influence policy and industry practices, while providing residents with modern, comfortable living spaces that promote health through reduced emissions. The community will include smart home energy systems, responsive heat pump water heaters, daylight-sensitive lighting controls, and a microgrid with energy storage and solar photovoltaics, ensuring resilience and sustainable living through both active and passive design strategies.
Palm City Transit Village was awarded Phase II funding to build the project in early 2024. Phase II of the project aims to establish and validate the cost-effectiveness of integrating advanced energy technologies within the standard design and engineering framework for a new-construction, multifamily housing development. This involves the practical application of high-efficiency design strategies and all-electric, grid-responsive technologies expected to replace conventional fossil-fuel-dependent systems in affordable housing. The project will focus on the operational phase post-construction to confirm the anticipated cost and energy savings for both property management and residents, thus providing a robust case for the financial viability of such sustainable building practices.
Additionally, Phase II aims to demonstrate these innovative strategies' environmental benefits and market readiness. The project seeks to provide concrete evidence of the advantages of adopting these measures in the affordable housing sector by tracking and analyzing performance data related to decarbonization, energy savings, and overall environmental impact. Moreover, a comprehensive knowledge transfer plan will disseminate insights and findings to developers, builders, and policymakers. This knowledge transfer is designed to catalyze the adoption of these technologies, support future policy developments, and serve as a demonstrative case study for deep decarbonization within the multifamily housing industry.
A project video, which was highlighted at the 2023 Annual EPIC Symposium in 2023, can be viewed here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rRHXZkNq8KA&list=PLIcSRKAeCVRjlZYqQRteN…
View Final ReportThe Issue
California housing is constrained, leaving few affordable high-quality, energy-efficient housing units available. This issue is compounded by a lack of density, especially around transit stops, and lack of nearby community resources and commercial spaces.
Project Innovation
The project will leverage and improve National CORE’s advanced approaches in building 100% affordable, all-electric, ZNE mixed-use projects in California and across the nation through a three pillared approach: 1) Utilizing the Design Phase grant funds to select design strategies with a downward cost trajectory; 2) Using designs that can adapt to future scale-ups; 3) Emphasizing energy equity and ensuring accurate M&V of tenants' bill savings.
Project Goals
Evaluate, implement technologies and building-level enhancements to deliver a carbon-free affordable and development.
Develop approaches to influence resident and building manager decision-making and encourage energy-efficient behaviors.
Project Benefits
This project will result in the ratepayer benefits of greater electricity reliability, lower costs, and increased safety by delivering an approach incorporating new design strategies and measures with additional cost trajectory evaluation, creating a pathway for a carbon free developer-community-transit triad throughout California.
Affordability
Affordability
Lower electricity costs for residents will be realized by using a virtual grid to amoritize the savings from the central PV system.
Equity
Equity
This project will develop an approach incorporating new design strategies and measures with additional cost trajectory evaluation, creating a pathway for a carbon free developer-community-transit triad throughout California.
Safety
Safety
Palm City Transit Village is designed to incorporate a building microgrid powered wholly by renewable energy from on-site photovoltaic panels. In addition to lowering energy costs, residents will enjoy uninterrupted power during outages and common areas will maintain climate control to ensure safety, health, and comfort.
Key Project Members
Hannah Behmaram
Project Manager
Momentum
Tim Kohut
Director of Sustainable Design
National CORE
Subrecipients
University of Southern California
