In the past two years, I've helped my parents-in-law make dramatic improvements in their home. Two years ago, I tackled their building envelope, encapsulating the crawl spaces, sealing the air leaks, isolating the mechanical room, and adding insulation. One year…
I love to ask people here in Atlanta and other parts of the Southeast if they think it costs them more to heat their home or to cool their home. The answer I get is almost always the same -…
Here's Why That's the Wrong Question! If you're investing in energy efficiency improvements for your existing home or buying a new high performance home, calculating the simple payback for your investment is at best incomplete and at worst, completely irrelevant.…
Have you heard? Incandescent light bulbs will be phased out, beginning in 2012. This was part of the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007, signed into law by former President Bush. The ban targets general purpose light bulbs that…
The most interesting topic we covered in my first semester of college physics was fluid dynamics. I found it fascinating, especially Bernoulli's principle. It wasn't until I left academia and entered the field of building science, however, that I really…
2005 was an important year for me. Not only was I learning how to do Manual J load calculations, crawl space encapsulation, and home performance contracting, but I also drank peak oil kool-aid by the bucketful. I read everything I…
In 2003, I finished building a high performance home and moved into it. Shortly thereafter, I enrolled in a HERS rater class and got myself certified as a home energy rater. So, with all that experience plus my background in…
[Guest post by David Richardson] [Guest post by David Richardson] There are certain events that you can mark as life changing. For me, one such event would be the three day training class that I took back in May of…
I just read "How I (Almost) Saved the Earth" by Scott Adams, the cartoonist who created Dilbert, and, although it was funny, it was also a sad and telling account of the home energy rating industry. Adams recounted the frustration…
I visited a new house earlier this year that had a basement wall that looked fine* at first glance. At left you see this wall, with its 2"x4" framing and fiberglass batt insulation. That wall you're looking at, though, has…