Interview with Michael Nerrie

The other day I had the pleasure of speaking with Michael Nerrie, the builder and owner of a passive solar house in Walpole, New Hampshire. Mr. Nerrie’s home was recently selected for the cover of the Fall 2010 edition of the Northeast Sun. Below is a brief transcription of our conversation.

Michelle Rose: What inspired you to build a passive solar house?

Michael Nerrie: Coming from the ’70s, solar was big. The White House had a solar hot water heater and there were some good incentives. Alternative energy was in then but PV was hardly used at all.

I built my own solar hot water heater. I was a builder and then, for 25 years it just went off the radar. I was very frustrated in the ’70s when the alternative energy thing fell apart.

I was inspired by neighbors who had a solar hot water heater and then, later, it was the same thing with PV. It makes a big difference when you see it done by others; it’s often easier to do than you think.

Michelle Rose: How has your home changed since you originally built it?

Michael Nerrie: It looks quite a bit different than it did when I first built it. In the ’70s, passive solar was just getting started . . . the guidelines were different and not well established. I had way more glass than I needed. In the mid-’90s I cut down on the amount of glass that I was using.

Michelle Rose: What are some of the benefits that you have noticed?

Michael Nerrie: We get half of our heat from the sun and, now that we have PV, we get half of our electricity from the sun as well. So, now we have half of the overall heating and electricity costs.

Michelle Rose: What is your favorite part of owning a sustainable house?

Michael Nerrie: Sitting in the sunspace in our hammock on a zero-degree day wearing next to nothing, reading a book. It’s zero degrees out and 85 in the sun. It’s like having a tropical vacation on every sunny day of the year.

Michael Nerrie is both an organizer and a host for the 2010 Green Buildings Open House tour, which takes place this year on Saturday, October 2nd. For more information on the tour or to see specific information on Mr. Nerrie’s sustainable home, please visit http://www.nesea.org/greenbuildings.