When Henry McKinney MCIOB, TecIOSH, Director at Newtownstewart Ltd, began work on the Moville Passive House, he was determined to prove that performance and design ambition could go hand in hand.
That determination, backed by Mosart’s Certified Passive House Designer (CPHD) course, helped deliver a project now recognised among the best in Ireland: the Moville Passive House was named a finalist in the Irish Construction Excellence Awards 2025, in the Residential: Private Up to 5 Million category.
“Undertaking the Certified Passive House Designer course was a transformative experience that provided both the theoretical foundation and practical tools to deliver the Moville Passive House project.”
Bringing Design Ambition to Life
Through Mosart’s training, Henry gained hands-on skills in PHPP (Passive House Planning Package), enabling him to test design options, optimise insulation and glazing, and predict performance with precision. This practical expertise gave his team the confidence to make design decisions that balanced aesthetic ambition with the strict energy targets required for certification.
The Moville Passive House
The Moville Passive House sits at the mouth of Lough Foyle, looking out to the Atlantic, Binevenagh Mountain, Benone Beach and Portrush.
The house is built from glass, steel, timber and concrete, with cantilevered balconies for shelter and outlook. Floor-to-ceiling windows light the open-plan interior and frame the coast.
The design is fabric first: heating demand is cut through precise detailing and material selection rather than bolt-on renewables. A highly insulated envelope with breathable wall systems does the main work; a green roof, solar panels and a ground-source heat pump complete it.
Newtownstewart built it on a hybrid steel-and-timber structure. Key metrics:
- Space heating demand below 15 kWh/m2/yr, around 90% less energy than a typical home
- Airtightness of 0.58 ACH @ 50 Pa, twenty times tighter than standard construction
- Wall U-values below 0.15 W/m2K, minimising thermal bridging
- High-performance windows with U-values below 0.8 W/m2K
- Mechanical ventilation with heat recovery (MVHR) achieving over 80% heat recovery
Every design decision, from orientation and glazing to shading, insulation depth and junction detailing, was checked in the energy model before it was built, so the finished house met the performance requirements of Passivhaus certification.
From Learning to Leadership
Henry credits Mosart’s training for equipping him to manage that balance between creativity and precision.
“The CPHD course reinforced the importance of integrated teamwork and early design input.”
His experience reflects what many of Mosart’s graduates discover: this training provides both theoretical knowledge and practical capability to lead high-performance projects from concept to completion. For anyone considering the same path, the CPHD-level knowledge check is a quick way to see where you currently stand.
Delivered Under Pressure
The Moville Passive House was built through the pandemic, absorbing supply-chain disruption without giving up its performance targets.
The result is a light, sculptural home that meets some of the most demanding energy targets in construction. That took the builder’s craft, and the training to model what the craft had to achieve. With the CPHD behind them, Henry and his team carry the same certainty into their next projects.
“The CPHD course has been an outstanding learning journey and shaped my professional approach to sustainable construction.”