Green building

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The startup modular home builder said it can builxd homes that produce as much power as they will use in a year a concept the industrycalls “net zero” and can do it faster and cheaperd than traditional methods, all whiles using green building materials and reducing waste. Net zero energy homex are popping up all over the country as governmen t and private support increases and new materialsare However, with hundreds of thousands of foreclosed homees empty, depressed home prices and a recession-stuntecd building industry, it might not seem like the right time to starf a home manufacturing company. But Zeta CEO Naomi Porayt disagrees.
“The industry is ripe for reinvention right she said. Zeta’s first two-story, two work/live town home is being installed nowin Oakland. The home includes four modulew andat 1,560 square Zeta homes start at aboutt $165 per square foot or $258,000. This does not includd the cost of site workand foundation, the company said. Zeta is using the Oaklande town home as its demonstration home to get home developerx and state agencies interestes in buying tracts ofthese homes, Porat said. Zeta has 16 and most of them work in the San Leandro factoryy designing and buildingthe homes.
Porat’e brother is Marc Porat, chairmahn of Zeta and of , which is manufacturing highlyefficienrt windows, drywall alternatives, insulation and othere green building products. Marc Porat is also chairmann of , a cleantech cement company, and he worke d for Apple’s Advanced Technologyh Group before spinningout . Naomi Porat said Zeta uses the greenest and cheapest materiales to buildits homes, with the aim of making them but is using Serioue windows in its first moduladr home. Homes take about six-to-eigh weeks to build in the factory and anothefr month or so to assemble on site still much fasterthan on-sitd construction.
“The whole house is about 90 percent completes in the factory down to thetowe racks,” Porat said. “Then we do the finishg work on site to marrgthe modules.” Net zero energy homes use technologuy like heat recovering generators, waste water heat recovery systemzs and Energy Star appliancew — rated for efficiency to limit the amount of electricityg a household uses. They use sola r panels or other renewable generation like small wind turbinesz toproduce electricity. Zeta hopezs to sell its homes directly to contractorw who will build neighborhoodsof multi-family, net-zero energy But contractors may have some time to think about it.
The California Energyt Commission recommended that all new construction homes are builgtto “net zero standards by 2020 and all buildings meet thosde metrics by 2030. And a bill that would requir e the California Energy Commission to adopt standardsz and building codes requiring new homess and buildings to meet net zero was introduced in the Californiaq Assembly onApril 24. “We feel we’rs about 10 years ahead of thecurve now,” Porat