As much as we love retrofitting homes to make them more energy efficient, there is quite a thrill in building from the ground up because we can build them tighter than we can ever fix them (unless you want us to strip you down to the framing and redo your foundation!). Here is a countdown of the 3 houses we've built with jaw-droppingly low "air exchanges per hour." (under pressure) #3 Nelson County Cottage 1.5 Architect: Frazier Associates Photo Credit: Kevin Blackburn This a

There seems to be an assumption out there that your high heating bills and drafty house are caused by your windows and the solution is to replace them. The trouble with this is two-fold. First, even the best windows will not perform significantly better than the ones you have. The most expensive, most insanely technical and energy efficient window out there is the equivalent of an R7*. Ordinary windows are the equivalent of an R2 to R4. For comparison, the typical attic with

Ewww! Look at all the nasty insulation being hauled out of my basement. I feel like I can breathe better just seeing it go. Guess what good it was doing me? Not a bit! It wasn’t keeping my floors warm, it wasn’t keeping the damp basement air out of our lungs, it wasn’t keeping my heating and cooling costs down. To be fair, it was a nice cozy home for the mice (I guess the scratchiness doesn’t bother them). #1 Cut off Rodent and Bug Access While we were planning and saving for

Part 2 of 3 (Shadowing an Energy Audit) Quick Fixes The homeowner complained of temperature differentials. Wm asked where the thermostat was located and quickly solved that mystery. It was by the front door, directly in the path of the sun and on the west side of the house, which heats up in the afternoon. Her thermostat was registering the correct temperature and sending a signal to the hvac unit that their job was done. Simply moving the thermostat to the middle of the hous

Part 1 of 3 I don't know about you, but I find energy audits fascinating. I always want to know what each house scores in air tightness and what the main culprits are. I'm like a soap opera junkie who can't wait for the next episode. When we complete a retrofit, I'm equally as excited to learn what the NEW score is and what percentage reduction we achieved. The best we've ever done is 73%! We hooped and hollered and cheered and had a little dance party with our kids. We just

Every time someone calls or emails to schedule an energy audit one of the last things I say to them is, "If you have pet birds, you'll want them to visit the neighbors as the pressure change will bother them." No one has ever had pet birds, so I've gone on spreading this unneeded advice for years. Well, someone finally had pet birds (complete with a nest and eggs)! The home owner didn't have a place she could take the birds, it was frigid outside and she feared even moving th