BlueGreen Consulting Group Inc.

New research by Building Science Corp is showing that R-values fluctuate as temperatures change. In a great technical piece, Martin Holladay examines the latest research on the subject in his blog post:

The starkest finding is that polyisocyanurate (ISO board) is the most erratic when the temperature of the foam itself dips below 15C the gas in its cells condense and don’t inhibit heat flow as well. As you can see from the graph above, ISO performs really poorly below -15C to the point where it approaches the R-value of wood… which kinda stinks because ISO is so much less expensive per board foot than other foam pannels.

So if you’re building in cold climates, its wise to take this drop in performance into consideration.

An appeal to all of you who know a scientist, are scientists or value the work of scientist. I met up with a group of mainly UofT scientists a few weeks back called Evidence For Democracy. The story they paint is grim for the future of science in Canada. Grants for basic science are evaporating. Increasingly the grants are tied to corporations and scientists don’t work for the public good but for corporate profit. It is a worrying trend.

A few people from Science for Peace were also there.

Evidence for Democracy (E4D) advocates for the transparent use of science and evidence in public policy and government decision-making. They seem to be the Canadian equivalent of the USA based Union for Concerned Scientists.

A national, non-partisan, and not-for-profit organization, E4D formed out of concern over recent government cuts to important science institutions, and policies that restrict the flow of scientific information to the public. Governments can be tempted to make decisions based on ideology or political convenience unless the public loudly demands that decisions be based on evidence.

We had the great pleasure of air leakage testing a new off-grid, high performance house last week. It was the most air tight building we’d ever tested – pre-drywall!

Situated on a hill overlooking the sweep of the Saugeen River below.

Builder Steven Dennison of Dennison Homes and building envelope consultant Patrick Andres, a Certified Passive House Consultant (CPHC) have officially produced the most airtight home we’ve ever tested in Ontario for an off-grid build going up in Saugeen Shores. If there’s a tighter one we want to test it!

From left to right; high-performance tester Shervin Akhavi (BlueGreen Group), Certified Passive House Consultant Patrick Andres and builder Steven Dennison of Dennison Homes take moment to celebrate the home’s air tightness record for Ontario.

This lovely house built on a hillock in farm country, overlooking the Saugeen River had a traditional look. Using Nudura Insulated Concrete Forms (ICF) for the basement walls and 8 inch Structurally Insulated Panels (SIPs) for the above grade walls Steve took it up to 11 and added more insulation!

The exterior walls were clad with another 1.5” of extruded polystyrene and the interior also had an interesting product from Nudura – expanded polystyrene with integral wood strapping at 16”oc.

ENVELOPE DETAILS:

• R 24 underslab insulation
• R30 below grade walls
• R 58 above grade walls
• R 75 cathedral roof
• R 80 truss roof
• Doors were from Fibercraft Door Company in Hanover, Ontario.
• Windows were produced by  Southwall Insulating Glass of Chicago with a pair of Heat Mirror 88 film in the sealed glazing.

The poly air barrier on the top floor being puffed in by the air tightness test.

The Southwall super-insulating glass with suspended film in a fiberglass window frame were beautiful. These units have a high frame R-value and come in multiple colours with optional stainable wood veneer interiors. George Strickland, the manufacturer’s representative, has been promoting the line in Ontario for the last two years. George says “The Southwall glass units can be included in any type of window frame allowing for adaptability in style and design, in commercial or residential applications.”

George also supplied the exterior thermal doors which were made by Fibercraft. These high performing single and dual (French) doors are made with Fibergalss skins and come in smooth or wood grain stainable finishes. They also came with the Southwall glass built-in.

Window detail showing the Southwall’s super-insulating glass with suspended films in a fiberglass window frame.

The air leakage rates, with a leaky cellar door came in at an amazingly low 0.52 Air Changes per Hour at 50 Pascals (ACH₅₀) with a mere 32 square inches of equivalent leakage area (ELA). Though the wood stove and HRV were not in yet, this basement door was super leaky and the drywall wasn’t clamping the poly on the second floor.

Driving in we crossed a half dozen wild turkeys (Meleagris gallopavo).

Rare are the homes we see these old relics in. When I was doing energy audits in the late 90′s for the EnerGuide for Houses program (no rebates!) I would come across these cast iron devises screwed to baseboards on the main floor – about where you’d place a thermostat. I always asked home owners if they knew what it was for, sadly, no one knew, until I came across an octogenarian who was born in the house!

She said there were a pair of cables attached to the main floor wall that passed through the slots in the plate and went to the furnace. The cables controlled the dampers for the burn rate on the furnace apparently.

This ornate cast iron plate was screwed the the main floor baseboards of a1910 double brick home in Toronto. The plate reads “THE GURNEY FOUNDRY CO. TORONTO” Those were the days when we actually made things!

I was able to find an old stove catalog from the Stove Book, but wasn’t able to find the plate above. Times have changed in these old double brick houses! I shudder to see an old gravity furnace (no fan circulating the air through ducts) with a coal chute chugging away.

Windfall Ecology Centre and Project Neutral teamed up to host a workshop held today at Toronto City Hall. With an estimated 80 participant homeowners, BGG was asked to present on the “Double Brick Energy Retrofit”. A tough subject to cover in only 30 minutes, but we tried our best!

Following the presentation, Sandra Lester, Gail Lawlor, Paul Caverley and yours truly, did our best to answer questions as concisely as possible. Overall the feedback was positive and we’re all excited about the City of Toronto’s new Local Improvement Charge.

Panelists field questions from the audience. From Left to right Sandra Lester, Gail Lawlor, Paul Caverley and Greg Labbé.

The North American Passive House Conference opened with a reminder of why our work is so important and ended on a retrospective on why North Americans need to repatriate ‘Passivehaus’. We were reminded that we’re “spending our carbon allowance” and that ambitious goals like Edward Mazria’s 2030 challenge are needed to curb our buildings’ need for energy. The closing speech delved into the huge climatic variance in North America and also reminded us that a few Canadians played a crucial role in the development of the techniques of ‘passive home’ and even coined the phrase.

Joseph Lstiburek warns us all about “pulling numbers out of … [their/your] ass” and drew our attention to ‘over ventilation’ and why 10CFM per occupant plus a small area allowance was likely the best ventilation rate. Sorry for the fuzziness, I was shaking in the presence of the great one!

If you can only attend one conference…

The conference, held at the very grand Omni William Penn hotel in downtown Pittsburgh, was vibrant and focused on cutting edge details to do with building efficiency. It was my first PH conference and already I can say if you want to be cutting edge, you need to attend this conference if you can only attend one conference.

Panelist fielding a questions at the Hootenanny: Chris Senior, Brandon Weiss, Tessa Smith , Natalie Leonard (The green one) and Skylar Swinford and moderated by Dan Whitmore.

There were plenty of Canadians at the conference and two towering participants need mention here; Natalie Leonard and Dr. Russell Richman. Natalie is an east coast builder and has more North American passive homes under her belt that anyone. I heard her as a panelist at the hootenanny and her plain talk set her in the pantheon of the best high efficiency builders in North America.

Ryerson University and Building Science

Dr. Russell Richman also gave a talk, but more importantly, two of his graduate level students, David Hawkins and  Matthew Tokarik were in attendance and David gave a talk on building quality. It bears mentioning that no other academic on Canadian soil is advancing the super high efficiency agenda more that Dr. Richman.

Other notable Canadians in attendance at the conference included architect Terrell Wong, builders Sylvia Cook, Ed Marion, Matthew Schiedle, Kathy Garneau and window manufacturer Stephen Thwaits.

L-R at back: Shervin Akhavi, Mike Anderson, Front: Ed Marion, Peter Amerongen, Natalie Lenard and Greg Labbé.

In the end PHIUS President Katrin Klingenberg, long suffering and doggedly determined, shared her thoughts on the necessity for keeping the performance high while being flexible on the future requirements of a new PH standard. For example, one can build a PH in California with insulated 2×4 whereas the climate makes things significantly more complicated in other climates. So the concept of a North American made, equally stringent but flexible climate specific.

PHIUS President Katrin Klingenberg and Oakville Builder Ed Marion pose post conference.

Fianlly, Katrin presented evidence that Rob Dumont coined the term “passive house” in his paper circa 1973 entitled “Passive Solar Heating – Results from two Saskachewan Residences.

Which stated in the introduction “Considerable interest has been shown in the use of passive solar heating. Two conferences and numerous papers have dealt with this tpic. The pioneering work of Trombe, Balcomb and Anderson has led to a greater recognition of the cost-effectiveness of passive solar heating. For Canadian imate conditions little detailed work has been done in this area. A number of recent papers by Cooper, Gilpin and Jones and Tymura present theoretical studies of the performance of windows and passive houses in Canadian conditions.”

Apparently both Katrin and Dr. Lstiburek had to dig information for their respective presentations from “stacks” in a place called a “library”…