A Climate-Resilient Future Starts with Knowledge.
Empowering the next generation to reimagine buildings, communities, and the planet — through sustainability education and action.
What We Do
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Knowledge Sharing
PHFE first provides an interactive presentation (online or in-person) on Passive House principles.
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Creative Explorations
Through a holistic teaching approach, we help students from schools of all levels explore the ideas and concepts of sustainability creatively. We are constantly amazed by the ways young minds interpret these concepts in new ways.
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Hands-On Training
Following the depth of learning from creative explorations of Passive House, through hands-on training, students gain deeper building sustainability skills to actively engage in the growing workforce opportunities within the energy efficiency and clean energy job sectors.
Why Buildings Matter in the Climate Fight
Buildings account for up to 70% of greenhouse gas emissions in cities like NYC. At PHFE, we teach young people how to change that.
By bringing Passive House design principles into K–12 schools, higher ed, and local communities, we empower youth to rethink how we build and live — for the health of people and the planet.
Featured Explorations
With the strong belief that teaching our children is among the best ways to lay the groundwork for a sustainable and equitable future, we form continuing partnerships with schools to teach Passive House concepts.
Our goal is to scale this educational initiative so that everyone, local, national and global, can benefit from the power of Passive House knowledge to help improve their lives in the built environment and support the growing demand for knowledge and skills needed to build a sustainable world. Here are some of the Passive House explorations made by students from NYC Public Elementary & High Schools and Post-Secondary.
What Teachers & Parents are Saying!
“Exploring passive house building principles through the arts is definitely beneficial to the learning process as it introduces ideas in meaningful and fun ways where students can express themselves freely while helping to create a culture of awareness of environmental sustainability. I have observed the students in class, and I can honestly say that they have truly, truly enjoyed the experience.” 
- Dawn Story-Rodgers, NYC Boys and Girls HS Assistant Principal
Get Involved
Workshops
Join us in bringing this program to communities and schools in your state, and in working towards establishing a strong environmental literacy into the educational curriculum.
Volunteer Opportunities
Are you interested in contributing to our workshops? Whether you’re interested to teach, promote, help fundraise, or design, we would love to invite you to share your talents with us.
Partnerships
Whether you are a non-profit organization, industry stakeholder or corporation whose mission aligns with our cause, we invite you to partner with us on working towards universal environmental literacy through the arts and hands-on training.
Funding Support
Contributing to our funding program will help us to continue giving our workshops at no cost for students. We hope you consider supporting us by funding our Passive House workshops today.