SLS-Construction
March 29th, 2010, 01:19 PM
Pretty interesting read
By George Musser (http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/solar-at-home/index.cfm?author=109) @ Scientific American (http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/post.cfm?id=are-old-houses-doomed-the-conflict-2010-03-26) (owns an older Victorian Home)
My wife and I always wanted an old house. McMansions leave us cold -- although, after all the time, money, and sweat we've poured into our place, I'm beginning to see their attraction. Our efforts last year reduced air leakage by just over 10 percent (http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/post.cfm?id=finding-more-ways-to-conserve-energ-2009-05-04), which was deflatingly meager. After more weatherizing, the house is comfier, with fewer drafts, a more uniform temperature, and a slower cooling-off rate in winter. But I still dread the day of the month when we get our heating bill.
Even our energy auditor (http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/post.cfm?id=before-we-began-a-home-energy-audit-2009-03-02) says he's running out of ideas for easyish steps we could take. Upgrading appliances is hard to justify economically (http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/60-second-science/post.cfm?id=how-to-become-more-energy-efficient-2009-04-29). Air-sealing the house to modern standards would mean ripping off the siding and wrapping the house from the outside. Replacing the gas boiler and steam radiators with a geothermal heat pump and forced air would run $68,800, of which state subsidies would cover about half. That estimate was the funniest thing I'd heard all day. And the sticker price wasn't the real shock. Rather, it was the fact that the system would lower our heating bill by only about a third.
Newer construction can give you a factor of 10 (http://www.passivhaus.org.uk/) since it's easier to fit than retrofit. In our September 2005 issue (http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=more-profit-with-less-car), energy conservation pioneer Amory Lovins described his own house in Colorado. It is so superinsulated that it never needed central heat. In December I visited 41 Cooper Square (http://www.cooper.edu/cubuilds/), a LEED-certified (http://www.usgbc.org/leed) classroom and laboratory building at Cooper Union, and was astounded by the sheer number of green features and design principles (http://www.greenbuildingsnyc.com/blog/david/cooper-unions-41-cooper-square-laboratory-is-mean-green-and-demands-to-be-seen) that are simply impossible to incorporate in any building after the fact.
In an essay (http://www.finehomebuilding.com//item/6812/taking-issue-energy-upgrades-threaten-older-homes) last year, preservationist Sally Zimmerman of Historic New England argued that the demands of energy conservation threaten old houses. She cited one retrofit near Boston (http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2009/01/29/green_makeover_home_edition) that cost $100,000. It had to be done with extreme care since old houses were designed to breathe, and reducing their air circulation can cause moisture buildup and mold growth. The homeowner has a fascinating blog (http://superinsulating.blogspot.com) that makes you realize how intimidating the endeavor is. Zimmerman wrote: "Perhaps the most likely outcome of a large-scale push toward deep-energy retrofits of older, less well-maintained homes is an increase in whole-house teardowns as owners and developers weigh the costs of new construction against these modifications."
I asked Lovins whether my house is hopeless and he reassured me it isn't. Having worked with him in the past, I know he's not a man to sugarcoat things, so if he says my house is salvageable, I tend to believe him in spite of my worries otherwise. In general, he says it should be feasible to cut an old house's energy use by a factor of two to four. His group, Rocky Mountain Institute, helped to retrofit a building for which historic preservation was paramount: 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue (http://www.rmi.org/rmi/Library/D94-09_GreeningTheWhiteHouse). True, cost wasn't much of an object. But Lovins says that new technologies and techniques are coming within everyone's reach. For instance, Serious Materials (http://www.seriousmaterials.com) is working on an adaptive window glazing whose infrared emissivity would vary with temperature -- keeping in heat during the winter, keeping it out during the summer.
For the rest of the article - Scientific American (http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/post.cfm?id=are-old-houses-doomed-the-conflict-2010-03-26)
By George Musser (http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/solar-at-home/index.cfm?author=109) @ Scientific American (http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/post.cfm?id=are-old-houses-doomed-the-conflict-2010-03-26) (owns an older Victorian Home)
My wife and I always wanted an old house. McMansions leave us cold -- although, after all the time, money, and sweat we've poured into our place, I'm beginning to see their attraction. Our efforts last year reduced air leakage by just over 10 percent (http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/post.cfm?id=finding-more-ways-to-conserve-energ-2009-05-04), which was deflatingly meager. After more weatherizing, the house is comfier, with fewer drafts, a more uniform temperature, and a slower cooling-off rate in winter. But I still dread the day of the month when we get our heating bill.
Even our energy auditor (http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/post.cfm?id=before-we-began-a-home-energy-audit-2009-03-02) says he's running out of ideas for easyish steps we could take. Upgrading appliances is hard to justify economically (http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/60-second-science/post.cfm?id=how-to-become-more-energy-efficient-2009-04-29). Air-sealing the house to modern standards would mean ripping off the siding and wrapping the house from the outside. Replacing the gas boiler and steam radiators with a geothermal heat pump and forced air would run $68,800, of which state subsidies would cover about half. That estimate was the funniest thing I'd heard all day. And the sticker price wasn't the real shock. Rather, it was the fact that the system would lower our heating bill by only about a third.
Newer construction can give you a factor of 10 (http://www.passivhaus.org.uk/) since it's easier to fit than retrofit. In our September 2005 issue (http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=more-profit-with-less-car), energy conservation pioneer Amory Lovins described his own house in Colorado. It is so superinsulated that it never needed central heat. In December I visited 41 Cooper Square (http://www.cooper.edu/cubuilds/), a LEED-certified (http://www.usgbc.org/leed) classroom and laboratory building at Cooper Union, and was astounded by the sheer number of green features and design principles (http://www.greenbuildingsnyc.com/blog/david/cooper-unions-41-cooper-square-laboratory-is-mean-green-and-demands-to-be-seen) that are simply impossible to incorporate in any building after the fact.
In an essay (http://www.finehomebuilding.com//item/6812/taking-issue-energy-upgrades-threaten-older-homes) last year, preservationist Sally Zimmerman of Historic New England argued that the demands of energy conservation threaten old houses. She cited one retrofit near Boston (http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2009/01/29/green_makeover_home_edition) that cost $100,000. It had to be done with extreme care since old houses were designed to breathe, and reducing their air circulation can cause moisture buildup and mold growth. The homeowner has a fascinating blog (http://superinsulating.blogspot.com) that makes you realize how intimidating the endeavor is. Zimmerman wrote: "Perhaps the most likely outcome of a large-scale push toward deep-energy retrofits of older, less well-maintained homes is an increase in whole-house teardowns as owners and developers weigh the costs of new construction against these modifications."
I asked Lovins whether my house is hopeless and he reassured me it isn't. Having worked with him in the past, I know he's not a man to sugarcoat things, so if he says my house is salvageable, I tend to believe him in spite of my worries otherwise. In general, he says it should be feasible to cut an old house's energy use by a factor of two to four. His group, Rocky Mountain Institute, helped to retrofit a building for which historic preservation was paramount: 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue (http://www.rmi.org/rmi/Library/D94-09_GreeningTheWhiteHouse). True, cost wasn't much of an object. But Lovins says that new technologies and techniques are coming within everyone's reach. For instance, Serious Materials (http://www.seriousmaterials.com) is working on an adaptive window glazing whose infrared emissivity would vary with temperature -- keeping in heat during the winter, keeping it out during the summer.
For the rest of the article - Scientific American (http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/post.cfm?id=are-old-houses-doomed-the-conflict-2010-03-26)