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Energy Hog – Attic Air Sealing

The first of our home improvements projects to cut the energy usage in the home was air sealing in the attic. Now I have to admit that when I started doing the work in 2005, I did not fully understand the importance. Now that I inspect homes or follow up on insulation contractors’ work, I see firsthand how important air sealing work really is.

A simple explanation of what air sealing is, it is the work performed on the home to reduce the amount of air infiltration into the home by sealing small and sometimes large gaps and crevices. I utilized the DO–IT–YOURSELF Guide to Sealing & Insulating with ENERGY STAR to perform the air sealing in the attic before installing insulation. These holes in the home can waste approximately 25% of the typical homes heating and cooling cost and is almost always the most cost effective improvement that can be done to most homes to reduce the utility bills and increase the indoor air quality (IAQ).

Air sealing not only helps reduce your heating and cooling costs, but sometimes more importantly, air sealing helps to improve the indoor air quality and durability of the home. Tighter homes typically have less dust because not as much gets pulled in through these cracks; they are typically more durable because excessive air and moisture does not enter the walls or attic that could cause mold and rot.

The goal of air sealing your attic is to make the ceiling as air tight as possible to stop any air movement. Now most home owners don’t think of their attic being full of holes. However it is full of them, plumbing stack penetrations, wires, can lights and other ceiling fixtures. If you hold your hand over these holes, you can feel the hot or cold air from inside your home making its way into the attic, costing you money. Because as this conditioned air leaves your home, unconditioned air is being pulled into your home through other gaps or crevices in your home, typically in the basement (more on sealing the basement in a future post). When your home has low levels of insulation, it is easy to find these holes. However if you have good levels of insulation, you can find these holes by looking for discolored insulation, as most insulation types are air filters and the discoloration is a sign of air movement. So review the air sealing guide, buy a few tubes of caulk and cans of Great Stuff and seal up those holes and start saving.

Here is a video series on the Fine Homebuilding magazine website on air sealing your attic that is worth watching, or check out other attic air sealing videos on YouTube.

Energy Hog – Improving the Indoor Air Quality (IAQ)

Some of the very first projects that we did to the home even before we moved in had a great impact on our home, transforming it into a “green” machine. Now they had no impact on the energy efficiency of the home, however they have made a great impact on the Indoor Air Quality (IAQ), which is a very important issue as you tighten up the home and improve its overall performance.

Loading carpet to be recylced.

The first project we tackled was removing about 75% of the wall to wall carpeting in the home. This ended up being the main living areas, hallways, as well as our expected child’s room. We did feel somewhat guilty for removing the brand new carpet that the previous home owner installed to sell the house. Especially since we removed it in July, and according to the label, it was manufactured in May of the same year. So as you can imagine, it was in excellent shape. So the larger pieces went to the Habitat for Humanity ReStore to be reused in someone else home. The remainder of the carpeting found its way into a trailer on its way to get recycled thanks to a local carpet installer.

Dirt found under some of the carpet that was removed.

Our primary reason removing the carpet was to expose the hard wood flooring that runs throughout the majority of the house and was hidden by the carpet. We had the floor refinished using Bona waterborne finish that has very low levels of Volatile Organic Compounds (VOC), and is very durable. Another reason for removing the carpet was we did not want our newborn child crawling on the carpet. So the carpet was replaced with an all natural handmade wool area rug in our living room. The reason being is an area rug can be thoroughly cleaned where wall to wall carpet will hold onto dirt, dander, dust mites and pollutants that people track in from the outdoors, such as oil and pesticides and can never be fully removed. A question posted after we removed our carpet here on the United States Green Building Council (USGBC) Green Home Guide website stated that the average carpet removed from a home is seven times heavier than when it was installed. This being contributed to the fact that carpets cannot be cleaned thoroughly like an area rug can.

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Kill’n a hog….an Energy Hog

Our home as it was purchased in 2005

Back in 2005 my wife and I purchased this ranch with a walk out basement. It is/was your typical 1960′s stick built home. Very low levels of insulation, single pane aluminum windows, with an unfinished basement and a huge backyard for the area, with lots of old growth trees. The view out of the dinning room window was the selling point. Some other nice amenities is that it is in a developed neighborhood with schools that are within walking distance, grocery within a mile. The town also has a very active year round farmers market. Plus the home was the mid point between both of our jobs at that time and is relatively close to a bus route.

The back of our home as it was purchased in 2005

However during the home inspection we found some troubling things. There was little to no insulation in the attic, the basement walls were uninsulated. And what makes that even worse is the fact that half of the house foundation is above ground. Not to mention the aging heating and cooling equipment. So we looked at this house as a blank slate, giving us the opportunity to not only renovate the home to fit our needs, but to do everything in an environmentally friendly way and to do it within our limited budget.

So this is where “Symbiotic Home” originally began. A website to help educate others on what can be done to green their existing home. Now with a good portion of the projects done, I will be developing this new series of posts that will backtrack and document each of the projects that we have tackled, and will even discuss future projects that we would like to accomplish. Giving you a glimpse of what we have been doing, how we have been doing it, and why as we green this energy pig.

So follow my home renovations as I walk the walk and show that green/sustainable construction can happen on the typical working families budget and I look forward to the discussions that this may create.

-Josh

Deep Energy Reduction with the Thousand Home Challenge

Thousand Home Challenge Threshold Calculator Last week I had the opportunity to attend an introductory webinar of the “Thousand Home Challenge” whose mission is to demonstrate the possibility of reducing our existing home stocks overall energy usage by 70-90%. Their goal is to achieve these reductions by energy efficiency measures, renewable resources, community solutions, and behavioral changes. The intent of the challenge is to use these thousand homes as a resource and educational platform for change to help transform our existing building stock.

The first step is to determine your energy reduction goal by using their threshold calculator. You have two options when it comes to determining your reduction goals. The first option or as they refer to as Option A, which is intended for high energy usage homes, sets a 75% reduction goal based upon a recent years’ verifiable energy usage. Option B is for low energy users and sets an energy reduction threshold based upon your zip code, finished floor area, number of occupants and a few other simple inputs.

Our home as it was purchased in 2005

So to continue the Sym-Home mission of educating others and to show that existing homes can make deep cuts in their energy usage; I will be enrolling my personal residence into the challenge. Considering my family has made significant energy related improvements to our home to bring down our utility costs, we are at the point of pushing the envelope, looking to make those energy related upgrades that the average homeowner doesn’t even think about. However we are considered to be a lower energy user, so we will be enrolling into the challenge and attempting to meet the energy usage thresholds of Option B. As you can see, by our current usage and goals set, we are still looking at a 42% reduction in energy usage to meet the challenge. I will continue the blog series, Kill’n a Hog….an Energy Hog, of tracking our energy improvements and take them to the next level as we go beyond what most consider to be a DIY project.

If you are considering some major energy related improvements to your home, consider enrolling into the Thousand Home Challenge. The first step to participating in the Thousand Home Challenge is to attend the introductory webinar to learn more about the goals, mission, and determination of one’s threshold allowance. So if you are interested, the next webinar is currently scheduled for May 31^st. Check out the 1000 Home Challenge website and enroll to make some deep cuts and help our country reach energy independence.

Do you walk the walk?

In a blog post by Heather Beal over at THRESHOLD, she asks “So what’s prevented the “yes-in-my-backyard” (YIMBY) attitude toward sustainability from spreading like wildfire among green professionals?”. She even offers up a three tiered approach to having a greener home on a budget. But really I think as green building professionals we should be held to higher standard and move beyond the three tiered approach.

The American Institute of Architects (AIA) has their Walk The Walk campaign advocating for all design projects within the office to be green/high performance projects. But that is focusing on what a design professional should be considering when designing/implementing projects. But it does nothing for advocating our lifestyles and what we do with our own home improvement projects. We should be leading by example. If you truly believe in the mission, you should be taking what you do in the office and bring it home. So the question is, with some of the details that you draw/build for your projects, would you use them on your own home? In essence if you consider yourself a green building professional in any way, you should bring you knowledge and expertise to your own home projects and use your own home as a living laboratory.

Yes, like some of our clients, we may have limited budgets, and also cursed with seeing all these great products or cool ideas that we would love to use. However that should not stop us from spending few extra bucks to improve the efficiency of our home, or buy the low VOC paint, adhesive or other materials. Because we know the benefits these stratagies have on lowering our utility bill and carbon footprint, as well as improving the indoor air quality and the quality of our families lives.

So follow me as I lead by example with my own home. Turning my energy hog home into a lean, mean, green machine. Improving the energy efficiency, the indoor air quality and the overall lifestyle of my family.

-Josh