Did the grass outside have dew on it this morning where you live? It did here. (That photo above is the actual dew on the actual grass on this actual morning just outside my actual house!) The appearance of liquid…
Yesterday we took our HERS rater class out into the field to get experience with the pressure testing equipment and data collection procedures. As a bonus, the house we visited presented us with an interesting mystery. Here are the symptoms…
I spent this week at the 15th Annual Westford Symposium on Building Science (aka Building Science Summer Camp). Great event. Great people. Lots of learning and thinking and networking. I spent this week at the 15th Annual Westford Symposium on…
Several years ago, I did a home performance assessment for a medical doctor - you know, the 'real' kind of doctor, not like those ivory tower, pie-in-the-sky, I've-got-a-theory kind of doctors who have PhD instead of MD behind their name.…
Do you have floor joists in your crawl space that look like the one to the left? In case you can't tell how bad it really is, just click on it to see a bigger version. When you do, you'll…
My two sisters-in-law have been in town the past few days, and one of them needs to get an energy audit for the home she and her husband recently bought in Seattle. I gave her a recommendation for a company…
On Monday, I wrote about the new Concept Home Program offered through ENERGY STAR for Homes. I learned about it at the 2011 RESNET Building Performance Conference last week. On Monday, I wrote about the new Concept Home Program offered…
One of my all time favorite books is Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert Pirsig. It’s really good on a lot of levels, but one thing that really stuck with me was the author’s discussion of how…
You open the door and are immediately assaulted by the damp, musty smell, even before taking a full step inside. If you're hyper-sensitive to these smells, you probably can't even go in without a respirator. If you're not that sensitive…