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.…
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…
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…
When I wrote about my trip to the Southeast Building Conference (SEBC) in July, I mentioned how some products on display there really annoyed me because they're either bad to the bone or overhyped. The main one in the latter…
This week I read and commented on Avoiding the Global Warming Impact of Insulation by Alex Wilson" target="_blank">Avoiding the Global Warming Impact of Insulation by Alex Wilson over at Green Building Advisor. I'd avoided the article for a while since…
There's been a lively discussion going on in the RESNET/BPI group on LinkedIn. I posted my article about how infiltration occurs at the surface, not in the volume, and it's generated some good comments. In that article, I said we…
At the gym the other night, I was thinking about a tweet I'd seen the day before: "@EFL_Guy 'Air leaks through surfaces not volume" Joe Lstiburek.'" I'd been meaning to blog about this for a while, so, during my workout,…
I'm not at Building Science Summer Camp this week. In case you haven't heard, the event, formally called the Westford Symposium on Building Science, is by invitation only. And I didn't get an invitation. Not that I would have gone…
I was in a crawl space in Atlanta yesterday putting a new home energy rater through his field test and found that this home has a dehumidifier down below. Not surprisingly, it ran continuously the whole time I was there. …
Do you know how most HVAC contractors charge for installing HVAC systems, especially in the case of new home construction? By the ton of installed air conditioning capacity. If you've read any of my previous articles about Manual J and…