Performance Evaluation of Shipping Container Potentials for Net-zero Residential Buildings

Recycled shipping containers have the potential to be successfully used as a net-zero ready home. This study aims to evaluate the outcomes of a high-performance shipping container single-family housing project located in Virginia Beach, Virginia. The project was awarded the Best Undergraduate Project in the Single-family division at the 2019 U.S. Department of Energy's Solar Decathlon Design Challenge.

The Hampton University Millennial Village Design Team designed a marketable net-zero ready container home for the ViBe Creative District in Virginia Beach, Virginia. Container Homes are not suitable for every homeowner, but they have a particular appeal to a generation of young and creative people across the country. For many municipalities in Virginia, where container housing is not readily accepted, the ViBe creative district has been having discussions with City code officials and local architects about the benefits. The Hampton University Millennial Village Design Team aimed to take advantage of the competition as an opportunity to explore a building construction method that is not widely seen in this part of the country. Testing design for net-zero readiness is a comprehensive way to understand how this type of construction performs from a building science standpoint. Collaboration with professional industry advisors helped the team to use research-based design methods to work on a unique project that the team believes will become a reality in the future.

For the performance assessment of a net-zero container house, several simulation tools were used to investigate the environmental impacts, daylight performance, envelope performance, Energy Use Intensity (EUI), Home Energy Rating System (HERS), and solar energy generation. As for energy standards and codes, the Virginia residential code (VRC) 2015, International Energy Conservation Code (IECC) 2015 and The American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE) 90.1-2013 for residential buildings were consulted to set each variable for the net-zero container house project. The Rem/Rate energy simulation software achieved the HERS index of 51 and 0 without and with the applications of roof photovoltaics, respectively.