TIFTON — A “zero-energy” house being built in the historic district is giving Moultrie Technical students on-the-job training.

The Tift County Foundation for Educational Excellence is funding the project, and when the house is sold the profit will benefit the foundation.

The house is part of the Green Tift initiative and students working to construct the house are students in MTC’s Green Building Technology program. Students in the program take courses in energy efficiency, energy audits, renovation and solar power installation and biofuels industry training. The students will be working in the fall with the “Future Farmstead” project, which will be the centerpiece and showcase for the Agricultural Energy Innovation Center at the University of Georgia’s NESPAL campus in Tifton.

Moultrie Tech received a $3.75 million two-year grant for the program last year. Tony Grahame, a nationally recognized expert in green building, was recruited and now serves as the instructor in MTC’s Green Building Technology program, said Mike Brumby, executive director of the education foundation.

Brumby said he and Grahame had begun talking about a partnership with the foundation to build the house and learned that Grahame has access to award-winning green architects who donate their services for non-profit organizations.

“We got the Downtown Development Authority to get involved as well as the Historic Preservation Commission,” Brumby said.

The Downtown Development Authority made the lot available at 403 Park Ave. for $10,000, and the education foundation will repay the DDA when the house is sold, Brumby explained. The education foundation is underwriting the project and hopes to make a profit for its community projects when the house is sold. Brumby said local businesses have donated building materials.

Brad Buchanan, a research professional at NESPAL – the National Environmentally Sound Production Agriculture Laboratory – serves as a liaison between MTC and UGA’s Green Tift programs. At the building site earlier last week, he said the house will be built “period correct” for the historic district but “super efficient.”

Buchanan said the house will use solar power to supply electricity with the idea that the solar system will produce more electricity than the house’s occupants need. Even though the house will be tied to the electric grid and be able to obtain electricity from the power company, five and a half hours of bright sunlight should be sufficient.

“We should be able to produce more electricity than the house uses,” Buchanan said.

The house is expected to be complete late this summer.

Brumby said that with the building of this “first zero-energy private home,” with the rural homestead at NESPAL and with plans for the Georgia Peanut Commission to build green on Lake Drive at I-75, the Green Tift Initiative is well on its way.

“This could stimulate all kinds of industry here,” Brumby said.

 

To contact senior reporter Angie Thompson, call 382-4321.