Energy Conservation How To

Weatherization and a State Bank, in a Mayoral Race

2012-01-27T13:36:00.000-08:00

I see a weatherization core in the politics of a mayoral campaign in Portland, Oregon. Our sitting mayor, Sam Adams, escaped recall thanks to voter lethargy, after lying to avoid losing his election in 2008. Our city has suffered malaise through his term. Sam Adams has wisely decided to not seek reelection, creating an early vacuum for a good array of candidates to move in.

I attended two rallies in the Portland mayoral campaign, last evening, January 26th. The first was in promotion of candidate Eileen Brady. The best part of that event was a talk by Paul Hawken, surprising in the clarity of a call for an Oregon State Bank, as a channel for keeping finance through our savings, local. Off Wall Street. Not gone to who-knows-where and maybe doing ourselves harm. The State Bank is a central focus of the new Oregon Working Families Party, and did not fare well in the Oregon Legislature 2011 session. I bet it is not a matter of passion, to Eileen Brady. Paul Hawken will remain an honored adviser, and will not expect much environmental or finance innovation through Portland's Mayor, whoever is elected.

I left the staid Brady event after an hour, for more-urgent attendance at a Jefferson Smith Party, a really joyous event. The Smith campaign makes no promise on the State Bank issue, yet it was Jefferson Smith who stood up for a State Bank, at a major Working Families Party event in Portland, February 1st, 2011. That attendance has earned my loyalty, to my State Representative. I was generously given opportunity to speak up in a Smith Town Hall Meeting in my neighborhood, on March 30th, 2011, before the dawn of the current mayoral opportunity. I will work very actively for the election of Jefferson Smith, to nurture whatever seed I have planted in a weatherization cause.

At the Eileen Brady event, I also wanted to study a relationship between Ms. Brady, and endorsers present, Jules Bailey, and Derek Smith, the City of Portland employee who elevated himself to run a new private business spending public funds for weatherization, Clean Energy Works Portland (now Clean Energy Works Oregon). More on this below.

I have my own view on utility of an Oregon State Bank, and see it has not before been posted here. It is as stated here in a May, 2011 email response to yet-another customer who declined my weatherization bid, for lack of up-front savings:

I imagine a radical escape from commercial banking, serving weatherization. A new Oregon State Bank could shuffle money for the work. The work with rapid payback gets done, and draw on the savings commences, in sustained higher utility bills or other repayment contract, with closeout at house sale. The contractor could draw from a liabilities account as needed, maybe leaving a lot in a retirement account. I see the important things we must do to survive, getting harder with each new catastrophe. This could apply not only where large energy savings are possible, but where hazards risk house destruction, as with faulty wiring or a failed roof.

By chance yesterday, I stopped in at the Portland Metropolitan Workforce Training Center, a facility of Portland Community College. I remarked to an attendant, that I work as a business owner in weatherization, with skills hard-won. Would someone talk with me? I had a wonderful half-hour meeting with the center's Director. We confirmed that no training is happening at the Center.

I reported that none is happening through money funnel Energy Trust of Oregon, per their online calendar.

I find no credible training in weatherization, anywhere except econtc. A well-meaning person in Portland, seeking to participate in "green" activities for needful employment, is abused in this. The cost now is $2995 for forty hours of dreadful misguidance, paid always by our federal or state tax dollars in some foolish grant. Some of the "BPI Certified" wannajobs do find work, in the abuse of home owners.

BPI certification and resolve to do weatherization "performance-based" are prerequisite of contractors who align with Clean Energy Works Oregon, CEWO, the only hope in Oregon for home owners who NEED the up-front financing of work that was promised in Oregon's HB2626 of 2009, feather in the cap of Rep. Jules Bailey, and should-be pride to the State of Oregon, that surpasses our first-in-USA Bottle Bill. CEWO takes taxpayer money justified by HB2626, and hands it out in big piles, usually to those with no need, and always with spillage to the privileged play-along contractors. I do better work always, than any of those on the take. My customers are never punished where I am not in the program, but very often my bids fail because work is not affordable. People just stay cold in Winter, with loss of productivity and consequence to health.

I think such status-quo inaction with weatherization is common. Federal stimulus money never made it out, thanks to BPI greed in trying to rig programs.

Oregon might yet lead the nation in weatherization, not subvert it through influence of Bonneville Power Administration, silly creator of Home Performance With Energy Star. Really finding the public financing, and sending it where it really is needed, is key. For this, we need our State Bank. Every state might need a similar bank. We need to see weatherization and home preservation in general, as suitable investments in a State Bank portfolio. Portland might move the ball some, in wise selection of its next mayor.

Dimmers Tested With CE T91/ LSGC Glimpse LED Plate Light

2012-01-15T17:55:00.000-08:00

Please see a report of dimmers found in my tests, to be compatible with LED plate lights sold as Commercial Electric, Model T91, and as Lighting Science Group, Model Glimpse. All function as expected, with similar luminaire hum that is quite acceptable to my ears. Many require range adjustment by a dial, to suit user preference for degree of dimming.

The report of my dimmer testing is visible by the following link, at Google Docs.

https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&pid=explorer&chrome=true&srcid=0Byj-qncyomXmNzM4NjJhNDUtZTNiZi00NGQzLTk0MWQtMTQwMjU5MDc3ZDhj&hl=en_US

Compatibility is noted vs. lighting manufacturer claims:
http://www.lsgc.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/GLM_9_20_11.pdf
Many dimmers listed here are not readily found on store shelves. Better availability will be found online at Lowe's or Home Depot. One interesting observation in the LSGC list is Lutron Model TG-603PG. That dimmer is stamped "For Permanent Incandescent Fixtures Only." This labeling contributes to my tested belief that most dimmers tried, will work. One may choose for style and function with confidence, certainly where packaging states LED compatibility.

I persist in this to avoid disparagement of LED lights in comments to prior blog posts. I have yet to find a dimmer that does not work as expected with Glimpse luminaires. Our attitudes will matter in a campaign to no longer use can lights in an attic floor. We must not think they will fail in dimming. I believe reports otherwise are from not finding and setting the dimming range adjustment, or from wiring error in a 3-way circuit.

Attic can lights should be avoided in all new construction. A leaky, perhaps non-IC can light, should be replaced with a junction box and an LED plate light. We must get rid of all weatherization instructions that allow leaky non-IC can lights to remain, where work is supported with rebates.

Q & A: Attic Walls

2011-12-30T06:54:00.000-08:00

At the dawn of 2012, my web pages are drawing sometimes-daily email questions. I am resolved that these will be addressed publicly. This will be more-productive use of my time, and will justify more-thorough answers. Others may pitch in through comments, to contradict or add to the discussion. This exercise of the free resources of Google, will have interesting differences from a bulletin board, and from a web site forum such as the Q and A at greenbuildingadvisor.com. Let's see how Blogger serves us.

I am asked:

In my unheated attached garage there is old fiberglass insulation with kraft paper on both sides in a gable wall that joins the house and garage. In the room in the house where this wall shares, the wall and the room feel cold during the winter. I would like to update and improve this wall's insulation and prevent wind washing.

How would you suggest I make this improvement?

This photo is included:

I respond:
To have any value, insulation must be packed against a convective surface. I'm guessing these are 2x4 frames, and insulation is R11. I have not seen this insulation marking before, and must accept your claim it has kraft facing on both sides. The hacked-off stapling tabs on the garage side might be an attempt to avoid working as a wrong-side vapor barrier. I wonder what now retains the batts. A kraft facing on the interior side would reduce wind resistance and further reduce insulation value.

I have considered the situation under a heading "knee walls", but from now on will use the label "attic wall", for both gable walls and closet knee walls dividing attic temperature from conditioned spaces. It will be an invention, like my naming of "attic floor pits", not yet in common use. Because of extreme summertime temperature differences, and because nothing prevents making attic walls thicker, they should have a better insulation requirement than walls exposed to outside temperature.

My advice is developed in a Picasa Web Album.

I have applied crossing R15 batts in 2x4 walls, with added horizontal 2x3 framing. After joist thermal shorting, each layer contributes about R11. I believe there is some added benefit in framing being full-depth only at crossings.

I show simple payback with the crossing batts, in three or four years. With space, have even more insulation. Construction in a gable or knee wall remodel could be difficult with added lumber heavier than 2x3.

Where there might be incentives for the better insulation, there should be no limit upon found conditions. In my area, a rebate is offered here in going to prescribed R15, only if found conditions are R4, or poorer. That is, R4.5 should be left as-is. And what would R4.5 be? It might be decent batts out of contact with the drywall, as in the photo with the question. In that case, improving the base layer would only cost less. Payback in improvement to R22 would be faster. It's the end condition, and the savings, that matter.

Please see also, development of this topic at my web site.

Progress With LED Plate Lights

2011-12-02T06:37:00.000-08:00

These "T91" lights are Home Depot store brand, Commercial Electric, only in packaging. The true origin is noted in labeling on the luminaire disk backside; Lighting Science Group Corp., LSG. Product Name: Glimpse.

I hope they will drive all can lights off store shelves, in all stores. The future of LED lighting of a ceiling is in flat objects. Or, perhaps still including linear objects such as LED versions of T8 tube lighting.

LED Disk Lights Replace Can Lights

2011-11-17T07:25:00.000-08:00

Home Depot has taken the lead, in offering affordable LED lighting affecting my work in attics. I can now replace a crummy can light, where too-hot bulbs pump heat into the attic, for less than $40. Where the can was foolishly non-IC, I can finish the insulation. This will be a lot more satisfying, than just replacing the can. An IC can, with a new LED bulb, is not a better deal than the Disk Light.

The Home Depot/ Commercial Electric T91 LED Disk Light will replace 5" and 6" cans. Even this 4" Halogen spot, that is pouring heat into an attic.

At 750 lumens, the T91 will need dimming in many situations. Dimmed to 10%, drawing 1.5 watts, it is a beautiful night light.

Please read more, in a Picasa Web Albums Slideshow:
https://picasaweb.google.com/108533770292578040917/LEDDiskLightsReplaceCanLights

The preferred installation has replacement of a can, with a 4" junction box.

Mouse Habitat

2011-11-12T09:08:00.000-08:00

Kraft-faced insulation in an attic floor allows a constellation of mouse houses.

They love the alleys from on-flat header framing. Tighter quarters in lofts atop framing are not kept clean.

The best response to mice in-attic is habitat destruction, by removing the facing. Tightly fill all crevices with insulation fragments or batt trims. The facing here always did more harm than good. Smooth facing has less wind resistance, than tufty unfaced batts.

I advocate elimination of all kraft facing in new batt manufacture. Instead apply a vapor permeable air barrier facing like house wrap, as an attachment means and as a stiller of air circulation within batts. Have as many faces as you wish in any stack. Place the face in any direction, downward in a crawl space or basement ceiling, outward on a knee wall, where the barrier serves to contain dust from human contact. I offered this idea to my favorite manufacturer, Johns Manville, in August, 2011. No response yet from JM, so let any manufacturer try it.

Wrap-faced batts should not be at the base in an attic floor.

Angie's List For All

2011-11-01T06:16:00.000-07:00

With effort, I got the four reports needed for Super Service Awards in 2011, in Insulation and in Doors categories, maintaining a demonstration of validity to me as a commentor on weatherization policies. Where but at Angie's List, can I find that public comment on my exceptional work, the "carrots" I work for, and no one could buy.

It was hard because most customers would not join, even where I showed them backdoor "deals" permitting membership at $12 per year for ten years. For anyone, not just Groupon grabbers. And, why would one want only temporary membership? Perhaps the deals, and general power brokerage by phone staff, offend more even, than high prices. Knowing a business will take more from me than from another, by times-five or more, just for being naive, surely kills a deal.

It seems Angie's List could not go public, after all, to extract funds from unwary new investors, to repay it's then-majority owners, the existing investors:
March, 2011: $53.6 million, various investors including T. Rowe Price.
September, 2010: $22.5 million, investors including Milwaukee's Wasatch Funds.
December, 2008: $6 million, Prizm Mezzanine Fund, Chicago.
April, 2008: $35 million, Battery Ventures

The total from fund investors is nearing $200 million. Can't find that list seen recently. The nature of non-public ownership is evident in this comment on T. Rowe Price ownership. Say the borrowing is $200 million, and T. Rowe Price has 9.8% ownership at 601,174 shares (then of 6.13 million shares outstanding). That's an investor price of $33 per share. A share price has meaning only when the public is let in. And then, wouldn't the investors get protection in the IPO, with more share leverage. I don't know how it works, but know the public loses in an IPO.

Angie's List is in truth, the collective intelligence of it's reporting members, including me. We are being sold out for foolish, can't last, greedy investment in Wall Street, like everything else. We can resist, by asking that Angie's list never go public, but instead repay investors through income vitality. I think Angie's List could, should, must, have at least twenty million paying members. Then, even at just $12 per year per member, there would be hope the debt could be repaid. At average $30 per year, times twenty million, The List would prosper. This is my dream, and long-standing shunned-rudely proposal: Perhaps half, including new members would be Honored members, paying $20 per year. Those who don't care to actively participate, might not resist the ordinary $40 per year membership. Yes, declared same prices everywhere. No more offensive deal-making.

Where are my Angie's List reviews?

2011-07-19T03:51:00.000-07:00

Finding diligent, creative, honest weatherization is not easy. One way is through Angie's List. Please see a prior post on this:
http://energyconservationhowto.blogspot.com/2011/01/should-we-rely-on-agencies.html

Getting diligent work of any kind saves energy. In weatherization work, missed opportunities of savings of blow-and-go competitors, is more entropy than benefit. It is so hard to go back and do right, where largest opportunities of savings have been sabotaged through burial, or where access is denied for achievement of attic ventilation or other repairs.

I work largely for the credibility of reports volunteered by my Angie's List customers. My work continues to be always-improving. Yet, I see that I must prod my few customers who are members, to retain status of Super Service for 2011. Angie's List has a Fetch Program that I will try. I do not ask for reviews, and want to not know which customers are members, such that I might favor them.

Now I see that Angie's List is trying a new approach to stay afloat with its high-price-strategy in hard times. It is in hock over $100 million to investors. The investors may get their money back from unwary buyers of stock, going public in an IPO! If they continue to need investor money to advertise and operate, how can they be worth $1 billion?

Vermiculite Removal

2011-06-06T10:06:00.000-07:00

A recently-purchased 1910 farm house had no access to attics, and cause to not trust hidden weatherization and wiring. A first attempt of access through the floor found tough shiplap sheathing, and rain of vermiculite within a dust-containment barrier. That vermiculite, diluted in drywall dust, was tested and tentatively found to have less than 1% asbestos content.

This temporary access was then cut through a low wall, and an excessive dozen vermiculite samples were collected in a mapped circuit of the attic. An area of 300 sf was found to have vermiculite depth 2" or less, and repair needs via a good drop-down ladder were found. Four samples were tested, and all were found to have less than 1% asbestos content.

To me, the 13" by 14" opening was sufficient for many further entries. It passed the 55-gallon drum liners that would collect the vermiculite and the usual roof debris. For any other worker, and for disposal, the planned ladder must be completed.

An area was emptied and then carefully vacuumed, that would contain the ladder. Twist connected wires from a wall switch to snipped knob and tube wires are among problems that will demand professional rewiring.

I of course do not work at any time without a suitable respirator.

The 14' span of 2x4 joists demands strengthening to tolerate any load in addition to the weight of shiplap and 1/4" drywall, and to allow a cut joist. I therefore must empty and clean the attic all the way across, and bridge out a minimum of interfering knob and tube wires.

Beyond the vermiculite, note poor sealing of balloon-frame outside walls by stapled foil-faced insulation. The floor was reasonably-well insulated, but an enabled energy audit will find important work needed in-attic, to insulate outside walls.

My dual-filter Porter Cable 7812 vacuum has 99.85% filtration efficiency. It was resident outside the attic, until the ladder was in. Then I mostly worked with the ladder door closed behind me. I will edit this post to address things I did wrong.

Jump ahead here, to a condition after debris has been carried down the new ladder. The floor is extremely rigid, far stronger than found, with framing in-effect 2x10 select fir. 9" strips of CDX plywood wall-to-wall are attached to the 14' found joists and to 13' 4" added 2x4's leveled to hold plywood flooring. Deck screws at 6" intervals make the attachment. The assembly locks a sag of nearly an inch at mid-span of the floor joists. At a stopped condition for electrical service, all floor area is again insulated, with R8 fiberglass batts minimum.

I like the disposal policy in metro Portland, Oregon, where vermiculite tested at under 1% asbestos, may be disposed as trash, at the Oregon City transfer station. Vermiculite at greater than 1% asbestos would have been handled by a licensed abatement contractor, with disposal at the adjacent hazardous-materials facility.

200 gallons.

A trash hauler might be arm-twisted to accept this. I doubt it. Placing it in a drop-box dumpster would have to be approved, and might raise concern and refusal in further handling.

Thoroughly wetting the vermiculite will reduce concerns on the further path to an Eastern Oregon landfill. I understand that vermiculite holds water. Much effort is needed to dry wet test specimens.

I will feel less bad about my contribution, than should disposers of bulk, where there has been no step of recycling.

I ask that Portland's Metro add receiving requirements for vermiculite, as "special waste." The application for this costs $25, and I think that is fair. Dock workers should not accept my unsubstantiated word, and they do not have means of recording permissions. In this case, special waste might have special handling: the wet-down requirement.

I was prepared here with a blank application, but wanted to experience the permitted procedure, and was happy to save my customer the $25.

Back at the job site, others will appreciate the wonderful Calvert attic ladder. It is Model 1028, with 28" x 48" rough opening. It includes my first try of the optional insulation panel to R14.

More Floor Sealing Examples

2011-04-09T18:12:00.000-07:00

Again, please go to this web page:
https://sites.google.com/site/phillipnormanatticaccess/Home/pdf-offerings

Here please pick the document posted 4/9/2011, titled Floor Sealing. The pearl here is insight to the installation of a GE microwave oven with kitchen vent feature.

Both posts this date invite comment to a blog. If you find the read worthwhile, please say so.

Better Bath Fan Installation

2011-04-09T18:07:00.000-07:00

Two lengthy dissertations will be presented, if one bothers to follow the links to a web site, where content is in pdf documents. Please trust that many will find useful discovery. In this post, I link to Panasonic bath fan installations, which include a better way to construct through-roof vents.

Please go to:

https://sites.google.com/site/phillipnormanatticaccess/Home/pdf-offerings

Please pick document posted 4/9/2011, Replace Bath Fan.

This parallels a blog posting and link to a Picasa Web Albums slide show:

http://productinstallationhowto.blogspot.com/2011/03/panasonic-fv-11vq5-bath-fan.html

New Construction Knee Walls

2011-04-03T19:30:00.000-07:00

This home built year-2000 has garage roof trusses rising to second-story roof level. It gives contrast to thoughtless knee wall construction where insulation was an afterthought. The wall shell is closed with tightly-fit 1/2" OSB. (The second-floor ceiling and attic floor, still with insulation pour on drywall, remains thoughtless and dangerous in such grand new housing. I head toward hard-shell covering of attic floors too. Insulation may stay at rest against gravity. Heat and misstepping persons, do not.)

The OSB shell was planned for in the design of trusses. I presume 2x6@24" joist bays are over-filled with R21 batts opposite the OSB.

This fits checklist, FRAMING Critical Details, www.northwestenergystar.com: "All knee walls are backed with a rigid material or other supporting material (e.g. wall to attic, skylight shaft, wall to porch roof, staircase to attic) (Thermal Bypass Checklist, Items 2.3. 2.4, 2.5).

This example conflicts with Energy Trust of Oregon Weatherization Specifications for existing homes, where no exterior wall is required, and in its place is called: WA 1.5—Open Wall Open walls that separate conditioned from unconditioned space, such as in garages that face a conditioned space, shall be sealed for air leakage, insulated to a minimum of R-15 (or the cavity must be filled), and covered with a vapor permeable air barrier to limit human contact - - -

It is NOT about human contact, but only the overfill and retention of insulation. An outside barrier that can not pressurize contained insulation, has no value. I am distressed that contractors in Oregon are compelled to place house wrap in this application. There instead should be movement toward complete hard containment, as in new houses.

Better than this simple hard containment, recognize too there may be insulation opportunities with crossing layers, achievable from the "back" side. A framer of a new house might not fathom the needs of an insulation installer. OSB pre-applied as in photos above, will have difficult application to better insulation of skylights.

55-Gallon Drum Liners, Again

2011-03-20T20:11:00.000-07:00

This builds upon a post of April, 2008:
http://energyconservationhowto.blogspot.com/2008/04/distributing-or-hauling-out-loose-fill.html

They aren't just for hauling trash, and distributing insulation. Here, I needed to bag insulation, to drag it past a tight obstruction. I could drag three 24"x48" R30 batts in each transit.

Here a messy bed of R19 cellulose interfered with provision of storage in an attic. Things dropped from a deck, into loose-fill insulation, are lost. The central half of the attic floor was cleared into drum liners. Cellulose depth at the periphery would then be doubled, in an upgrade of the attic to R38, adding only batts under decks.

More area at the periphery was tossed clean of cellulose to repair deficient floor sealing, and bare areas were then refilled from the drum liners.

The air duct in the photos above is the supply to a Heatilator gas fireplace, added after house constructio. The duct was thoughtlessly placed at a soffit vent, with removal of a vent baffle. With displaced cellulose, the baffle was reset, now using 2x4 blocks instead of just tapping in nails. It was interesting in this young house, to see confirmation of some of my ideas for older homes. Baffles should be plywood. Never cardboard or polystyrene. Kneewall closet walls are solidly clad outside with plywood or with OSB sheathing.

More Skylight Insulation

2011-03-15T11:26:00.000-07:00

This skylight had about 25% effectiveness of applied R21 kraft-faced insulation. We must learn to do better. Place base insulation intimate with drywall, and then retain a thicker outer wrap.

For better presentation of these photos, please refer to the supporting posts to Picasa Web Albums:

https://picasaweb.google.com/pjnorman/EverBetterSkylightInsulation#

Roof Cross Braces

2011-01-29T11:36:00.001-08:00

Getting around in an attic is sometimes made difficult by head bangers, there for uncertain reasons. The function of ties under a roof peak, between roof joists, is to resist uplift and ruin of a roof, in storm conditions. Some will think the purpose of ties is as found in code requirement of collar ties not more than one third distant from tops of walls, to the roof peak, to hold walls in absence of ceiling joists. Collar ties will have little relevance to residential construction.

Here is a slide show review of the problem, and some solutions.

Here is another view of the solutions, in a web page.

Should We Rely On "Agencies"?

2011-01-28T06:52:00.000-08:00

The last post suggests reliance on "agencies" to achieve good, honest work in weatherization. I don't think that is the way.

Public display of customer reports might work. We might all belong to an affordable and more-informative Angie's List. With diligent reporting of satisfaction, or being wronged, a careful home owner could intelligently choose honest workers and consensus best practices. I have tried to influence Angie's List to entice fuller membership through low pricing, and reward of responsible participation. Suggestions include a Honored Member status, earning half-price annual fees, at not more than $20 per year. All new members are Honored Members, helping them over a barrier of uncertainty, where one must pay first, to see the value. Honored Member status is retained by responsible participation, say a combined number of five, in posted reports and referred new members. With five years of Honored Member status, it becomes permanent. I want Angie's List to succeed in this way, and welcome customer reports on my work. Good work, reported, is my investment in advertising.

Another solution is having self-maintained records of work well done. I imagine Google-like companies (several) setting up data warehouses, where the condition of our homes is a public record. Things that matter to society get recorded. Measures taken for energy efficiency are for the common good, and are included. Posting is voluntary, with rewards. The public record is a basis for home valuation at resale, and for more-favorable taxes and mortgage interest rates.

Why Cheat With Attic Insulation?

2011-01-23T21:10:00.000-08:00

I will always do what it takes to not bury savings opportunities, or hazards, under insulation in attics. Every job needs at least minimal walkways, to guard against step-through where safe footing becomes hidden. Any footing, buried or not, must be screwed down, as trick footing is far more dangerous than none. Access will happen in every attic, and that must not trash insulation. Accessibility for inspection must be required. There must be no open floor pits, or insulation voids, as complained of in the previous posts, and comprising missed savings opportunities. Every hidden diligence measure with significant cost and savings must be recorded with photographic proof, sparing inspectors of dangerous or impossible tasks.

Why not cheat, when there is low probability of inspection, or a declared policy of permission, that things like "air sealing" are not required. and there are no rules against voids. Voids predictably occur with blown insulation, under or in the lee of lumber and ducts. Voids occur where batts are ill-fit, or are carelessly placed over joist bays that are not full of insulation.

While cheating is permitted, many contractors will feel compelled to participate, for survival. They will offer the excuse that no one has taught them, or commanded them, to do right. One listed on the New York Stock Exchange will do it, perhaps leading the way, on behalf of detached investors. Much of the easiest energy savings in homes will be left undone, for many more years to come. We should not blame only the compromising or dishonest contractors for this. Agencies that will not use their heft for best results, will be largely to blame.

Booby Trapped

2011-01-23T20:58:00.000-08:00

How would one know that all of this insulation by the honored, unnamed competitor, missed sixty percent of the energy savings society wishes? An inspector will not justify risks in the dangerous darkness, or have the time, to find the buried crimes.

Here is approximate math on the missed savings, as a graphical summary, for conduction/ convection through the attic floor:

A sea of poorly-placed insulation would have saved about $130 per year, while correctly placing the same insulation will save a total of $200 per year. The missed savings of $70 per year are less important than those related to diligence, sealing the attic floor. Closing a plumbing vent chase floor pit that exposed 150 sf of walls on three floors, will save $120 per year. The negligent work would have achieved a total $130 per year, only forty percent of the achievable $320 per year, with the same added insulation. Where the installed cost of insulation is only about $800, the savings neglected were hugely significant.

Dissing of Diligence

2011-01-18T05:43:00.000-08:00

Complaint of a dissing of diligence, in the prior post, had a specific basis.

A large and honored competitor, seemingly gets away with complete disregard of diligence, and outright fraud.

All found trash, and anything they drop, is left for burial. Unfilled joists are left as voids, cancelling the value of covering insulation over at least 25% of the space. Since insulation matters mainly where there was none, added insulation (that I had to pile elsewhere) was almost entirely wasted.

The fraud was in having a contract to seal the floor pits (wiring holes and any open chases), not doing that work or faking it, and accepting payment.

This is a first look at the meanest failure to seal, at the main plumbing vent. This kind of situation exists in most attics, and will be well-known to the worker. A glob in a spot is of no use. The worker is apparently instructed that sealing is expenditure of one can of an inappropriate foam. When it is empty, you're done.

The scheduler, and management, knew I would overturn their work to install an attic ladder, new bath fan, decking and more, out of sequence, after they were done. Despite this, workers wasted foam all over the dirty insulation around the fan, accomplishing nothing.

I got to see work not prettied by exceptional effort.

Spaghetti noodles decorated electrical junction boxes buried under insulation, and about 10% of the wiring penetrations over walls, expending the rest of the can.

The dry spaghetti didn't wet or seal, anything. The worker did not supply that can, or choose what to do with it. This must happen in every home "served" by this competitor.

Here is the full extent of the opening at the important pit, going down three floors, and exposing 100 sq ft of interior walls to attic temperature. The waste of savings would have exceeded all savings from properly placed floor insulation. for years to come.

Here is proper closure of the plumbing chase.

Here is proper sealing of floor penetrations for wiring, with stuffed insulation, and flexible grout.

Excellence Is Better Value

2010-12-15T17:07:00.000-08:00

Here is one "before" picture of the job in the previous post:

The effective insulation value of settled cellulose in 2x6 joists is about R11. Improvement to R38 with high-quality batts, will give modest savings, with annual heat cost dropping from $136 per year, to $46 per year. $90 per year savings, so far.

Dark, dangerous and dirty conditions invite inferior service of a home. All wiring of ceiling fixtures in this home needed replacement, perhaps from excuse the work up there had been so awful. Several wires for added fixtures were merely wrapped onto nearby conductors, stripped. No fire yet, but such contact must degrade with time. Despite now-excellent access, electricians charged as much for the few hours of fixing wiring, as I charged for all insulation labor and materials. But, how do you value a home saved from fire? Yes, this diligence pays.

Other diligence, enabled by cheerful access, will be the major savings, at near-zero cost. 275 sq ft of wall area was exposed to attic temperature, in floor pits, two gapped bathroom wet walls, and an abandoned kitchen heater chase; now tightly sealed. One needed to toss and vacuum off cellulose, to see this. Savings: $220 per year.

Total savings of $310 per year with diligence are large relative to investment. Payback for the homeowner's investment is in from three years, to eleven, depending on how much of the cost is allowed as savings-related. Better too, that the larger investment immediately raises house usefulness and resale value, by more than the invested amount. More ignorant cellulose here, would have precluded savings, and detracted from house value.

This homeowner placed value on my diligence that my rebates organization does not see, encourage or reward. A 25% tip was appropriate, for satisfaction way beyond his imagining at bid. This gives me satisfactory earnings, usually missed in this dismal business of competition with blow and go madness. I find it hard to be paid for my diligence, where it isn't even reportable. "Failure to demand diligence is reward of sleaze," as I chide with a "Diligence Report," in my rebate applications.

I state my complaint against dissing of diligence, to customers, and raise the ire of my rebates organization, Energy Trust of Oregon. How else can I get action? Energy Trust of Oregon is a pretty good organization. Perhaps there is none better. But, they persist in regressive policies best serving the affluent. They seem unable and uninterested, in guiding customers to diligent service.

Another Really-Nice Job, Done

2010-11-30T05:40:00.000-08:00

A well-insulated attic may also be highly functional and pristine. This well-decked floor is a solid R38, under decking, and all the way out to walls below. Still missing: I want to cover the insulation batts with cotton sheets, to further protect the homeowner from insulation dust particles. Also still missing: enough ventilation to keep the attic cool in summer. I will replace the gable vents with house-symmetric, remote-operated windows, and will install a solar attic fan. The bath fan, seen here to discharge within the attic, will be hard-plumbed to a roof vent.

Where a gas furnace is placed in the attic, efficient and safe access is mandatory. Here a furnace shutoff switch was missing, and was added.

Please see more details of this service at my web sites, for policy matters, and for access door/ ladder matters of commerce.

The insulated and gasketed wood fold-out attic ladder is a Calvert Model 1804, that I have modified for less-steep, easy deployment. Conversions for user convenience and safety are well worth a twenty percent increase of the modest cost.

Reason to Wrap Crawl Space Joists

2010-11-14T21:34:00.000-08:00

I offered the joist wrapping of the previous post, as requisite for doing the awful work of insulating crawl spaces, in three bids. None were accepted. One reason could be offer of standard wired-up batts, at much lower cost, by more-willing competitors. The added cost of $500 to place R11 joist wrap was not sufficiently justified. This post presents the justification, with consistent use of my however-questionable math.

The previous post has inconsistent rigor, in considering thermal resistance of framing over a crawl space. The annual cost of heat lost to an uninsulated crawl space with 2x8@16" oc framing is reckoned with a bit more rigor, as:

1.8*1000 (1.5/16/9.8 + 14.5/16/3) = $561 per year. Compare to computed $600 per year, where joists and all are treated as having the R3 minimum value.

The $58 per year heating cost for the proposed R11 and R30 batt placement is again considered with allowance for joist thermal resistance, as:

1.8*1000 (1.5/16/20.8 + 14.5/16/33) = $58 per year.

Without the R11 wrap: 1.8*1000 (1.5/16/9.8 + 14.5/16/33) = $67 per year.

The puny difference is $9 per year. My customers should question the wisdom of paying $500 for such benefit, where I have confidence in achieving the $67 per year cost, if I would offer the work.

The wrap is justified for any other installer, who, wiring up batts otherwise, fails to achieve full contact of batts, with floor sheathing. Such installers offend customers with lost savings opportunity, and offend subsequent service access with sharps and obstacles. Estimate the savings of heating cost by wrap placement, assuming no benefit, where R30 batts are out of contact, as difference from $58 per year ideal cost.

Cost = 1.8*100*(1.5/16/9.8 + 14.5/16(f/33 + (1-f)/3)), where f is fraction floor contact.

If batt contact is poor, it is very affordable to fix the problem by incrementally pulling down wires, and stapling R11 on joists. There should be no need of outside incentives, as in rebates, to fix a wrong installation. The incentive might be in denied incentive, where full contact is not achieved.

Insulating My Crawl Space

2010-10-27T21:34:00.000-07:00

I've lived in my house in Oregon's maritime climate, for seventeen years. I have good attic insulation, and OK wall insulation. The energy usage in heating my home is below-average, but that may be from letting the house run cold. Much of the time in cold winter, I need good shoes and heavy socks to cope with floor temperature. There is only a very beginning of insulating the crawl space, but surely I will get the rest done soon, now that I have a likable plan:

Wrap joists with 16" width R11 unfaced batts. Complete filling with R30 kraft batts.

There is absolute assurance batts can't fall, and less time thinking to pull batt edges down to cover joists.

Here is the math, for Portland, Oregon, with area 1000 sf:

Present heating cost is 1.8 * 1000/ 3 = $600 per year.

Wrap joists with unfaced R11 batts. Retain these batts with 1/2” staples both sides of joist, at spacing of about one foot. Do this wrap in parallel with R30 installation, beginning at the most-distant end of attic.

Place R30 kraft-faced batts as blocks 16” x 48”, Johns Manville Product K1242. These batts more-fully fill joists, and are readily defended as R30. The thermal shorting of joists is considered.

R = 3 + Reff, where 1/Reff = (1.5/16)/17.8 + (14.5/16)/30.

Reff = 28.2

Improved heating cost is 1.8 * 1000/ 31.2 = $58 per year.

Savings $600 - 58 = $542/ yr.

Cost of insulation:

The R11 is calculated as length at 16” width, total 760 linear feet, where I will use Johns Manville AU397, sixteen 8-ft pieces per bag,128 linear ft per bag. Need six bags, at $266, retail. For a customer, I would charge $500 for the R11 installed.

The R30 K1242 insulation needed is 1000 sf/ 58.66 sf/ bag, seventeen bags, $666 at retail. For a customer I would charge $1300, installed.

Subtotal: Approximately $500 + $1300 = $1800.

Consider payback on this cost, with Energy Trust rebate, $.25*1000 = $250, and, a 30% Federal Tax credit on material at retail, 0.3*($266 + 666) = $280.

Payback = (1800 - 250 - 280)/$542/year.

Payback = $1270/ $542/year = 2.3 years.

This kind of math overwhelms most customers, who have at least two just complaints. There is the fair cost of fuel, higher than their bills by about times 1.5. Like me, customers may also choose to not compensate, staying cold. I spend about $500 per year for natural gas heat, in a 986 sf home. Surely $350 of that is due to cold floors. At fair fuel cost of $2 per therm, my floors are blowing at least $500 per year, not much different from the $600 prediction. Maybe I am less thrifty with the thermostat, than I think, and less thrifty than that skeptical customer.

I have been foolish to not do the crawl space insulation sooner. I preserved overhead space for recent Pex-replacement of all water pipes, but could have managed all that crawling under the insulation I now propose. I have done an attitude check under my test bay, and don't feel more-confined. Head bangers are cushioned. On the other hand, where most installers would run crazy wires to "hold-up" the batts, I would have many snags to curse.

Unresponsive RTF

2010-10-20T08:31:00.000-07:00

This message was sent to persons unknown, at RTF, on September 15th, 2010:

To RTF:

Please see beginning of an interaction with Regional Technical Forum, on math bases for "deemed measures."

https://sites.google.com/site/phillipnormanatticaccess/Home/bpa-math

My numbers are thoroughly and publicly derived. Measure details are real, learned in first-hand down-and-dirty experience. I assert that I am nearing maturity in a self-taught college of weatherization. I wish to find my place among other researchers in Portland, and anywhere.

I ask to see bases for the numbers in the RTF work product.

Phillip Norman

Attic Access

It seems I am not entitled to a response. That is crummy. This is Day 35 of waiting for any response. At Day 13, I asked for support from Energy Trust, and was advised:

My guess is they’ll take your numbers into consideration. No guarantees of the outcome.

The message to RTF does imply criticism of their hugely-expensive, unfriendly and unprintable "work product." I find the RTF numbers are cruelly inaccurate, showing modest penalty for living with no insulation. I think the BPA/RTF numbers may have some basis in a sampling of actual before-and-after energy costs, considering heating season only, where lifestyle choice is not considered. "Before", we are less-productive in conditions of freezing, not affording enough heat. We are foolish if we afford ourselves air conditioning.

Any reader may make the comparisons, to judge merit in the work product paid-for extravagantly from our remittances for BPA electricity.

Math Error Found

2010-10-01T06:31:00.000-07:00

Sadly, the clothes line math error is in the direction of lesser justification for savings effort. The math of Build It Solar is quite correct. Further math for understanding is correct at my web site: Convert KWH at 29.3 KWH per therm and 12 pounds CO2 per therm. About 410 pounds of CO2 results from generating 1000 KWH. Here is one credible outside source for the conversions. The 410 number looks right for the Northwest mix of sources, mainly coal and hydroelectric.

Numbers above are from the UC Irvine link.

Allow that my two-person household would be using 860 KWH per year with full resort to an electric dryer. Saving half of that is 180 pounds of CO2 and $30 at $2 per therm, per year. Savings are smaller (by half?) where I have a natural gas dryer.

The error found? It is in the often-cited CS Monitor article. Annually, these dryers consume 1,079 kilowatt hours of energy per household, creating 2,224 pounds of carbon-dioxide emissions.
1079 KWH converts to perhaps 440 pounds of CO2.

More Clothes Line Math

2010-09-29T22:41:00.000-07:00

Build It Solar - Clothesline Thoughts

Drying clothes in a gas or electric dryer is energy intensive. An electric dryer uses about 2.3 KWH of electricity to dry one load. In addition, as the dryer vents its exhaust out of the house, new air is pulled into the house to replace it, and in the winter, this new air must be heated. If the temperature outside is (say) 30F, it takes about another 2 KWH to heat this incoming air. In climates where AC is used in the summer, air pulled in by the dryer must be cooled. So, drying one load can takes from 2.3 KWH to 4.3 KWH for each load -- a lot. If you do a load a day, then you probably spend about 1000 KWH per year on drying energy.

I'll figure 200 loads in a year, for a two-adult household. Without AC, figure 860 KWH. Do the Math on that.

One therm is 29.3 KWH and 12 pounds CO2. 860 KWH is 29.4 therms and 350 pounds of CO2. If I save half of that, it is about fifteen therms, $30, 180 pounds CO2.

Where is my error?

More Thought of Carbon Footprint: Shunning My Clothes Dryer

2010-09-29T22:04:00.000-07:00

It is time at last to curtail my luxury of mindlessly tossing laundry in my natural-gas clothes dryer. The conversion from electric heat in a hand-me-down, free dryer was ticket for ease that I let go through another Summer. What is the amount of my savings opportunity?

I refer first to one of my clothesline shopping discoveries. I will just accept for now that a two-person household, with half-time resort to clotheslines, may save 500 pounds of CO2 per year. The saving is sizable, judging by math for my total carbon footprint, about 20,000 pounds of CO2 per year. Every measure that might save another 1000 pounds of CO2, will be painful.

The cost of a durable, convenient and presentable clothesline seems to be more than $250. How does this pan out in a payback calculation, the Insulation Math?

A therm corresponds to emission of about 12 pounds of CO2. 500 pounds is 42 therms. At $2 per therm, my saving is $84 per year. A $300 clothesline cost is repaid in less than four years, 28% simple return. Worth doing. Worthy of incentives. Spending $300 will not be extravagant.

An Especial Obligation to Honesty

2010-09-21T04:47:00.000-07:00

Bonneville Power Administration is a rare government creation that is self-funded, with much money from too-abundant power sales, to spend as it chooses. The money is a corruptible basis of BPA influence. That is why BPA has an especially large need of public scrutiny. Actions to that end include this, of March 24, 2010:

AN EVALUATION OF THE REGIONAL TECHNICAL FORUM – Final Report –
http://www.nwcouncil.org/rtf/meetings/2010/04/RTF_Eval_EMI240310.pdf

This report is kind to its sponsors, accepting exponential growth of RTF.

The scrutiny is not always voluntary. Among scholarly reviews, I have picked as significant, this PhD thesis, dated November 27, 2007:

The Columbia River's region: Politics, place and environment in the Pacific Northwest, 1933--present

https://scholarsbank.uoregon.edu/xmlui/handle/1794/6280

BPA Post One

2010-09-06T08:07:00.000-07:00

Why should BPA have a voice in weatherization of our homes?

They have not updated their primitive weatherization advice, since 2004. They should not bother. The call, still, for use of duct tape, is indicative of the advice-writer's detached irresponsibility. Surely the advice is just that of a consultant with no first-hand experience.

Following BPA advice leads to the common crawl space disaster of critter haven above insulation. There are warmed underfloor lairs, until the batts fall down. The nerve, to not know, even today, that a tied-up R19 batt does not fill 2x8 framing.

BPI Flu

2010-08-31T08:59:00.000-07:00

The nature of the illness is throwing around the word "performance" and stating that improvement of "performance" is so key, that its practitioners should drive the weatherization wagon. Performance improvement, as used in acronyms BPI and PTCS, is only the little good someone in a clean shirt can do in an hour or so of attempted tightening of a house envelope against infiltration or HVAC duct leakage, rarely for energy savings of more than $20 per year. The performance practitioners blessed with "certification" attend classes, pay large fees and maybe take tests, and can then call themselves "professionals." There is no checking back to show they are honest or do good work, as any employer would require.

The performance word, as blower door reading, is so indeterminate, that in fact only change of reading has meaning. This then mandates a "before" test, fudged as much as possible to be a high number, and, worst, serves as a preventive of air sealing. Someone seeing a problem can't fix it until its blower door consequence is recorded, and won't fix it, or does at five times the cost. If the fix will have no consequence to a blower door test, as with an attic floor pit, why bother? This is absurd. It is very costly in maintaining waste of energy.

I am heartened at finding a large majority of HVAC contractors warning of the misbehavior of BPI, and others, attempting to corrupt HomeStar legislation, for self-interest. I now feel freer to speak out.

I thought Bonneville Power Administration, Oregon and Washington had a lot to do with the BPI/ Home Performance phenomenon, nationally. I'm right about Oregon. Oregon is third in the nation, just a little worse than Virginia, in per-population acceptance of BPI certification. Most states have none.

And who is spreading it?

In Oregon, forced by publicly-funded BPA and its child, Regional Technical Forum, pressure to get with the program is intense. In Washington, it is only PTCS that has been enforced. I will hope to understand the forces for conformance in New York and New Jersey.

The claimed-biggest "trainer" is Everblue Training Institute, location unknown, perhaps Charlotte NC.

Numbers in red above include "service providers" franchised by WellHome.

WellHome, Masco Brands:

Isn't that scary regarding intent to steal public resources through HomeStar?

Building Performance Madness

2010-08-31T03:34:00.000-07:00

Letter to the City of Portland person responsible for Clean Energy Works, sent 8/20/2010:

You saw the full depth of the problem in the well-meaning man who spoke with you, just before I did, at August 3rd Green Drinks. "I have nearly finished my BPM (sic) training. How can I become part of your Program?" I imagine his "training" is with econtc, upon which I comment.

I took little of your time, mentioning that I have construction skill and insights useful to Clean Energy Works, in my opinion. As a sole proprietor, I can't be all things, rejecting BPI investment, properly the realm of full-time professional furnace mechanics. The real skill of fixing things is missed when money and project control is directed only through BPI-Certified contractors. I mentioned "diligence," and other ways of administration.

You saw that BPI Certification very often is unrelated to the ability or wish, to fix anything.

I am trying very hard, to have a voice and a role in state and national implementation of up-front financing, as the progressive way to do weatherization, putting the money in the hands of consumers, for qualifying projects of the very greatest worth and integrity. My Insulation Math is far more useful than a blower door.

Diligence En-Masse

2010-08-30T10:51:00.000-07:00

The skylights slideshow supporting the previous post, notes $94 per year heat-cost savings in one row home of a large complex, with investment payback in only two years. Diligence in application to neighboring units would net this same savings more than thirty times over. I have the method, and the interest of one neighbor who oversees the maintenance of all units. How shall society efficiently get the work done?

Here is my pie-in-the-sky. I imagine real implementation of Oregon's HB2626, where I could clear a project for all residents, with 100% up-front financing. HB2626 was NOT imagined as a tool to empower select big businesses (regardless of their record of diligence) and to hand over any profit to overseer BPI general-contractors as "aggregators." The money must be available for any Oregon RESIDENT or resident association, not contractor, for diligence-proven qualifying projects.

We have hardly begun to define a working version of HB2626, and seem to have abandoned leadership for the nation, of Oregon Senator Merkley's S1574.

What is wrong here?

2010-08-30T10:30:00.000-07:00

Distress that prompted the previous post might not be understood, without direct posting of relevant photos and captions.

The knee wall at left is insulated to R30, and I am in conflict with this rule, in not covering it with a vapor-permeable air barrier, "vpab." If I were to comply, I could apply drywall, or least-costly wood, perhaps 3/8" plywood. I would NOT use house wrap. But why? Why? Why? The knee wall is better and more-stably insulated than the adjacent exposed wall of a bathroom, not a knee wall, and not commanded to have vpab. For that bathroom wall I placed an over-fill of 2x4 framing, with quite-well-retained unfaced R19 batt insulation. I took the picture for good reason, though I struggle now to express that reason. With some consciousness, I did NOT do the R30 thing with this wall.

This is found insulation of a typical skylight shaft, in a row-house complex with 2x4@24" oc attic trusses. Insulation is all pretense, stapled crazily over framing and not preventing complete bathing of shaft drywall, in convected attic-temperature air. Construction was in 2002, and the installation would not pass inspection, then or now. At least sixty skylights are visible in satellite photos of the row-house village. Attics are poorly insulated in other ways, missing the R19 cover of loose-fill in the lee of any object, and at any point of maintenance. A bath fan installer might think rebuilding of fragile insulation is futile.

Here is the skylight with R11 fill among 2x4 on-flat side wall frames, and found R21 kraft fill among 2x4 upright end frames. Crossing R15 batts, and the first-layer insulation, are retained by 2x3@16" oc added framing, and screwed-on wood lath. Overall R-value a bit under R25. If a vpab is needed for insulation security of all knee walls regardless of R-value, a vpab would be demanded here too. It is not demanded, and I think no one has bothered to set standards for skylight insulation. Someone should, and, please let there not be call for a vpab.

Rules Without Reason

2010-08-24T06:43:00.000-07:00

I am subject to rules of my rebates organization, that I must break in correct service of my customers.The rules that have troubled me most are the call of a vapor-permeable air barrier on the exterior side of knee walls, and the 100% rule for vapor retarder placement.

1. Vapor-Permeable Air Barrier:
(From July, 2009 Insider, for example)

Quality control tip of the month: vapor-permeable air barriers
A vapor-permeable air barrier is required to receive Energy Trust’s insulation incentives in human-contact areas and for kneewall projects. Insulation in attics, basements, garages, storage areas or other areas where occupants go for routine maintenance or storage must be covered with a vapor-permeable air barrier to limit occupant exposure to insulation fibers. Kneewall insulation, whether new or pre-existing, must be covered with a durable, vapor-permeable air barrier material to prevent air penetration of the insulation and to ensure the insulation is held in full contact with the wall cavity. Kneewall areas are often designed to have passive ventilation, which promotes air movement behind the kneewall.

Since insulation is most effective when air movement is static or trapped, the vapor-permeable air barrier minimizes wind-washing, and promotes optimum R-Value and energy savings. The key to a vapor-permeable air barrier is using a product that allows vapor transmission but blocks air movement. There are several new, inexpensive woven-nylon-sheet products available at big box stores and professional suppliers. For more information on installing complete insulation measures, view Energy Trust’s 2009 Weatherization Specifications Manual.

One clue of error in reasoning, is the application only to human-contact areas. The real and only purpose, applicable even in a hard-to-crawl, small knee wall alley, is to keep ill-sized, non-retained batts, from falling down. Isn't it?

Another clue of error in reasoning is the practical exclusion of non-air-barriered low-density, loose-filled attic floors, from enforcement. That fact is proof concerns are neither wind-washing, nor protection against dust. I have challenged my enforcement contact to find an insulation manufacturer spokesman who will say there is special concern of wind-washing in a knee wall, or that there is any consequence to R-value, of wind-washing on an attic floor.

I break the rule, where the expected compliance is stapling up a few hacked pieces of house wrap. That won't even retain a batt that wants to fall. It certainly adds no air-tightness. I was very disappointed in my one experiment in thus-compliance. I don't think any house wrap is sold with a useful tape to join panels, and bond to other structures. I had heard some contractors are complying, where anyone might check, by stapling up visqueen, and slashing it. My contact denies this would be approved. I'm not convinced it doesn't happen. Slashed visqueen is in fact not inferior as hold-up band-aid, to pieces of house wrap. My careful framing and double-layering is NOT a band-aid. R15 and less is NOT ENOUGH, where more will fit.

I seek change to an "R30 Rule" for knee walls and all permissive vertical walls, in part by example in my work. Please see my discussions and experiments, here, and here. My recent post on insulation of skylights inspires this fresh summary. Rules on security and amount of vertical-wall insulation, where thickness is not constrained, must apply equally to knee walls and to skylight shafts. Would there be any virtue in stapling some house wrap to try to stabilize precarious skylight insulation? Much better to use containing framing and crossing batts, for a standard R30 minimum.

2. 100% Rule for Vapor Retarders:
This is stated many times in 2010 Energy Trust Specifications, for example, here:
In attics with no pre-existing insulation, vapor retarders shall face the heated area of the building. Do not install new insulation with a vapor retarder on top of pre-existing insulation. There should only be one vapor retarder in the assembly, and it should be in contact with the heated ceiling. If existing attic insulation has a vapor retarder on top surface, slash with razor knife every 6 inches before adding more insulation.

I apply the common Two-Thirds Rule. Please see discussion here, and here.

My excellent examples of better service to customers by use of a Two Thirds Rule, are numerous. I don't like to break rules. It teaches disrespect. It makes me seem to be disrespectful, and in that I am being abused.

Bath Fan Sealing

2010-08-22T14:33:00.000-07:00

Noted poor installation of a bath fan had a few reporting errors.

There were two fans, both Panasonic FV08VQ3, a very common, excellent, extremely quiet 80 cfm unit that in fact is very easy to install. Light from bathrooms could be seen from the attic, corresponding of course to heat loss.

From below, installations seem to be tidy. The installer probably thought he had followed directions, and has probably done many similar installations.

Directions do not consider the most-common need, remodel installation through existing drywall. Here openings were enlarged, to replace silly American noise-makers.

Begin with knowing the guts of each fan must be removed.All screws are Phillips drive. Collect four that release the lightweight cover plate. Three more are machine screws that release the motor assembly, not dropping out.

In each case, the fan body flange was traced, and drywall was cut through to reveal half of the width of a truss bottom chord.

Drywall scraps, and the dead fans, were tossed into the trash heap of loose-fill insulation above.

The solution available to me, with the flexible grout I offer, was to reset scraps in properly-framed openings. This was possible in part because drywall was strong, 5/8" fire-rated, for condominium construction. The repair is as-new on three edges with wood backing. I will adequately glue the unsupported side, with flexible grout.

Here are the two openings, ready for fan insertion. 2x3 frame sides spaced 10 1/2" are attached to truss chords, with 3" deck screws. The openings in the other direction are 10 5/8".

Fan adapter assemblies, still wired, stand securely, with bottom flanges engaging the underside of the drywall.

Each fan body is pushed through from below, and is loaded against 2x3 rails, with 2 1/2" deck screws.

Complete reassembly of fans can happen now, ready for paint.

The adapter assembly top clips are rotated onto fan bodies, completing tight assembly, from above.

Foil-tape the ducts, and reset cable staples.

The above is an exercise in blogging, further learning what is possible with the free resources of google.com. I think this sharing of experience is a necessary investment to fight installation error, and waste of energy. I have started another blog as another way of trying this. I think an installation methods forum of some kind is needed, and will hope to at least be a contributor.

Better Insulation of Skylights

2010-08-20T18:50:00.000-07:00

Here is a captioned slideshow:
http://picasaweb.google.com/pjnorman/SkylightShaftInsulation#

Feedback

2010-08-12T05:41:00.000-07:00

I think I deserve thoughtful feedback, for provocative thinking on weatherization policies, and invention of methods. I don't understand the person(s), probably threatened, who comment with Chinese pornography. This post was inspired by thinking, well, no Chinese pornography yet, and silence from Saturn Resource Management professionals, on this, and the parent revision of my business objectives here.

But, there is no commenting to my web site!

So, have at it!

Diligence Almost Thwarted

2010-08-06T05:25:00.000-07:00

I post the content of a message to a customer. The exercise in math and logic may clarify my problem with any blower door testing, as prerequisite and director, for maintenance. I hope it will raise Diligence Honored, as a replacement for almost all Home Performance testing.

I monitored the conversation with your condo-complex General Contractor, about the 110 CFM Panasonic fan in your master bathroom. This fan is presumed 12” by 16” through ceiling. In fact the cut is 14” by 18”. The gap is hidden by the fan cover, but is unobstructed as a house infiltration path.
The involved flow area is 14*18 - 12*16 = 60 sq in.
CFM50 = 7.5 * (Path Area, sq in) = 450 cfm. CFM = CFM50 / 20 = 22.5 cfm

The annual cost of this leakage at fair $2 per therm, is 0.074 * CFM50 = $33 per year.

The 22 5 cfm constant flow is equal to fan flow running 22.5/110 * 24 = five hours per day.

Would you intentionally ventilate this much, or is this objectionable and involuntary?

Energy Trust would rebate half of the cost of fixing the gap, say $50 times half = $25. The rebate would require blower door tests before and after, surely in separate-day unhappy visits for you and the tester, at cost of several hundred dollars. The tests and rebate are of course absurd.

The general contractor did not give good advice.

A lesson for all of us, is that diligence must happen, at fair least cost, without a fuss, and without bad feelings because someone would pull the public string. All “performance” conditions for rebates, and all rebates should end. They are just a disadvantage to this good person, who will not abuse the public trust.

My customer liked this advice, and I will fix his fan installation. No testing needed. The math is far more accurate than testing, for any one repair.

The repair is not insignificant, and that is why an electrician or handyman walks away from his error. I will fully remove the fan, and rebuild the opening with real plaster, total job time about an hour. I will help anyone to be comfortable using plaster (not mud!), here Structolite. Weatherization sponsors should step in to require repair of installer error. Repairs should not be left to the rare capable weatherization person, and must not be rebateable.

I belatedly admit a simplification, and over-estimate of this problem. I well know that Panasonic fan housings are bottom-flanged, to align on and seal against the ceiling. That flange blocks the flow path, probably by about two thirds. This detail does not change resolve to do the repair. It does nothing to justify attendant testing.

Conflicted Test, Badly-Served Customer

2010-07-05T09:57:00.000-07:00

My job now in need of reporting was put off by the customer for more than a year. The customer was inspired by awareness of energy waste in a newly-acquired home, and the well-meant marketing efforts of the local purveyor of Public Purpose Funds, to accomplish an extraordinarily difficult job of house weatherization, beginning in the attic. The year of delay was in finding someone willing and able, to do the work. The immediate actions in an energy audit and home performance test ended with recommendation that nothing was needed beyond gooping and wrapping the HVAC supply ducts in the attic.

All needed work was obstructed by knee wall braces, nearly-complete nailed-down 1x8 ship lap flooring, and the trampled in-the-way wrapped HVAC supply ducts. This duct branch was directly over the best location of a new attic ladder, and much-better access was mandatory.

I found extraordinary savings to be achieved in this 1400 sf one-story home. Savings through my labor and placement of materials include reduction of conduction/ convection heat loss cost, of about $950 per year. $550 per year of this is due to closure of an extraordinary distribution of attic floor pits. $400 per year is due to the addition of insulation, from R4 to R38. There are further but much-smaller and indeterminate savings, from reduced house air infiltration. The dollar numbers, at $2 per therm, are large vs actual gas bills. They believably correspond to a modest one-third reduction of natural gas consumption, with a 1.6 ton per year reduction of CO2 conversion.

I have complained against the no-bid presented with the "confidential" home performance test. At this Picasa Web Albums page, I disclose the report scanned for me, by the customer.
http://picasaweb.google.com/pjnorman/AHomePerformanceTestDoesnTFixProblems#5490407824402329250

The customer paid $209 for perhaps two sets of blower door and duct blaster tests in a part-day of service where ducts in the attic were gooped, and were wrapped with 24" x 48" patches of unfaced R11 batt fiberglass. A $35 rebate is offered for just one blower door test per residence, I thought. Two seem to have been claimed, although the report does not have a second set of numbers.

I did very thorough sealing of the attic floor, as reported at my web site.

Home Performance Testing is Classified!

2010-07-03T06:42:00.000-07:00

I am shocked to find that Home Performance test reports by another contractor are indeed classified, and will not be shared unless volunteered by the customer. What is classified? I can see owner names, accurate house photos, and sale price and tax histories, on the internet. A local newspaper rats on water wasters. I think maybe the Google Street View scans should include infrared, as another tool in weatherization management!

I called my rebate organization here, as follow-up of a completed job, where the work was too difficult, and not likely profitable, and was declined as unnecessary, by a big-league contractor. My rebate organization at first denied testing had been done. Then they refused to share results.

Problems Solved With a Blower Door

2010-06-28T06:37:00.000-07:00

I declare I have never seen a home where weatherization problems demanded detection with a blower door test. This is in exceptionally competent practice as an individual, over five years, dealing mainly with attics. My practice does include walls and crawl spaces. For walls, I once found a garage wall driven-through, hidden by paneling, behind a wood pile, very leaky through insulation batts not-covered by the opposite face, and not detected by a home performance tester.

I charge that there are no weatherization problems to be solved in typical American homes, not best detected visually by a diligent worker. I do admit that a blower door can deepen temperature gradients, to improve detectability of hidden problems by infrared inspection, but note that infrared inspection is with expensive tools, not afforded by many Home Performance inspectors, and not demanded of them in Oregon.

My criticism of blower door testing is posted for comment to inspection professionals at Saturn Resource Management, Inc., in Montana. SRMI is an especially competent organization and source of training. SRMI publishes the best books I have found, teaching weatherization details.

Here are comments to my blog postings, by SRMI bulletin-board readers, Saturn Online:
http://srmi.biz/forum/YaBB.pl?num=1276355506/1#1

I further invite Saturn Online postings of examples that contradict my findings.

My Home Performance Test

2010-06-19T07:44:00.000-07:00

While I owned, and competently operated a blower door, I of course applied it to my own house, typical, well-built, 1950's ranch-style.

Here is the text of the Blower Door Test Certificate I produced:

Date: August 25, 2008

Baseline, My House

In a baseline test, all outside doors and windows are closed. If there are storm windows, they are closed. All interior doors are open. Fans and furnace are off.

Result: Airflow at test pressure (CFM50), 1330 CFM.

Results Commentary:
Desirable Air Exchange: Look at air changes per hour, ACH.
Consider ACH50, that at the minus fifty pascals test condition.
ACH50 = CFM50*60/House Volume
where house volume = 8 ft height times 986 sq ft floor area, 7888 cu ft.
ACH50 = 1330*60/7888 = 10.1.
Compare this to a minimum value of eight for a healthy home. Some further reduction would be desirable.

A reduction from ACH50=10.1, to ACH50= 8, is 280 CFM50. The value of that reduction, in annual heating cost, is 0.074 times change of CFM50, or $20 per year.

The estimated leakage under natural conditions (ACHnat) is approximately the result of dividing the test result by twenty. ACHnat = 10.1/20 = 0.506. Compare this number to a value of 0.35 to 0.5 for a healthy home. A target blower door test result is about 921 to 1315 cfm, for the target 0.35 to 0.5 ACHnat. A reduction of 280 CFM50, to 1050 CFM50, is a shift to ACHnat from 0.506, to 0.40.

A 280 CFM50 change corresponds to 14 CFM at natural conditions. Compare that to accelerated fresh air exchange while running a bath fan. A good bath fan for a 100 sq ft bathroom will be rated at 80 CFM. If I ran that fan four hours a day, it would average 14 CFM.

I have a typical house, and this is a typical result. Nothing motivating. Just a sick feeling about wasted time and effort. It is a typical home performance test overall. No other step to assess the "science" of the personal comfort and health in a home, offered in the typical hopeful "holistic" baloney. No offer to look for hidden problem areas with an infrared camera. No thought about Radon. No thought about control of relative humidity. No duct blaster test or furnace assessment competently at-offer, if not done by a rare professional home inspector or HVAC mechanic. Just the blower door show.

The commentary is above and beyond what most home owners receive. For most, there is nothing. A number might get written on a scrap of paper. It might appear in a report. There will be no offer of "fixing" anything. A particularly diligent tester might have tsk-tsd'd at a squealing window edge, and might have even done an impermanent and inappropriate repair, with a caulk tube. Anything serious is for another contractor, who will not likely see any of the tester's report.

If the testing is by an interest-conflicted blower of loose-fill insulation, repairs such as the so-often needed covering of attic floor pits, and bringing in an electrical contractor to deal with safety and convenience issues, will be precluded by immediate burial. In my area, that crook can then submit a fudged blower door report, and pad his bill with the rebate I would have been denied for my real, diligent, hard work. The home owner will then suffer unsaved heating costs, for many years. This is a crime of the incentives programs that exalt home performance testing. The awful wrong-headedness is well illustrated in a flyer from Energy Trust of Oregon, perhaps from a national template for "training."

Weatherization Boot Camp will teach you how to:
Reduce uncontrolled air movement by installing blown insulation materials to correct density.

What does that mean? For an attic floor without buried problems, it is absurd. For an attic floor with buried problems, it is criminal.

A Larger Appeal Against Home Performance Testing and a BPI Mafia

2010-06-12T08:03:00.000-07:00

Thanks to this news item:
http://energytrust.org/trade-ally/updates-and-events/insidernewsletter/?article=id_46
I learned who in Oregon has interest in the competent service of home performance testers.
The following, one-sided, so far, conversation results:

Sent to State of Oregon, on June 10th, 2010:

Hello Craig,

My experience through five years of extremely diligent service as an Energy Trust Trade Ally is that a blower door test never beats diligent sight inspection, in finding the problems needing repair in a house. Money should never be wasted in testing distraction, by people with no competence or interest in the repairs. All sponsor and consumer money should be spent on just doing the work. I speak out on this at my blog:

http://energyconservationhowto.blogspot.com/

Please do not hold interest-conflicted and often dishonest home performance inspectors, to a lower standard than professional home inspectors.

My Signature Here

Sent June 12th, 2010:

Hello again, Craig,

My post to you has inspired fine-tuning of this web page:

http://sites.google.com/site/phillipnormanatticaccess/Home/diligence

Please find me a competent critic of the snake oil as a national problem, in the clean-shirt job creation, and terrible waste and diversion from real work, of home performance testing. Someone must speak the truth. It will not be a suckered home performance tester. We learned at the last Energy Trust Residential Round Table, that despite the interest conflicted activity of groups like Energy Trust, the volume of testing is at an all-time low. Consumers see the truth. Professional home inspectors are right to fight the dilution of their opportunities to serve and survive, by people who know little and do not deserve credentials. They do cheat, to crank out that expected-but-impossible 300 CFM50 reduction. They know little else than possibly the setup of a blower door.

I sought defense of testing at BPI, and think I was consciously given a runaround. Here is the reply to a phone call, asking for examples, and reporting-for-comment, heard assertion of a "BPI Mafia."

Do you find any examples of usefulness in home performance testing by the links? I surely will not talk with econtc people, the worst creators of excess and marginal testers.

Good morning Mr. Norman, I would like to direct you to Jeff Catlin jeff.catlin@econtc.com and Kyle Chase kyle.chase@econtc.com because they are in Portland and would be happy to provide you with case studies and insight into the value of testing in and testing out of a home. I would like for you to go to www.affordablecomfort.org for a look at testimonials and content from a national perspective. I wanted to find one sample but all of the information shared was great. There are some interviews from 2009 that may give insight to your questions. Another site is www.energy.gov/recovery/faces . The bottom video National Weatherization Conference is great. I personally have witnessed energy savings of 65% and more, comfort levels never experienced and saved lives over the last 20+ years! Simple test in and test out does work. In my opinion, you could choose to partner with others that provide the diagnostic testing and proposal development and provide the service that you specialize in. I hope this helps and please let me know if you have questions. Thank you, Vikki

Vikki Murphy

Director of Affiliate Development

Building Performance Institute, Inc. (BPI)

877-274-1274 Ext 106 (Toll Free)c.com

518-899-2727 Ext 106 (Office)

518-899-1622 (Fax)

518-331-8965 (Cell)

www.bpi.org

Training, Accreditation, Quality Assurance

My Signature Here

Plywood Baffles

2010-06-10T21:38:00.000-07:00

I have lately been putting energy into my web pages, instead of this
blog. Since more people come here, I should transfer web site
information sometimes, to be in both places. I apologize for the
redundancy, and will do this with limits. Here is a first installment.

Plywood Baffles
I no longer accept that expanded polystyrene or cardboard baffles
have acceptable durability. Cardboard baffles see driven moisture,
and decompose. At elevated temperature, EPS evaporates.

This baffle for 24" oc 2x4 roof joists, has dimensions 22" x 24".
Plywood is 1/2" thickness CDX. 3/8" thickness is ample for future
jobs.

I place top-layer insulation batts, here Johns Manville AU333, R19,
24" x 48", all the way out to the exterior wall. The adjacent baffle here
will be withdrawn and reset, to place the next batt.

Here is a look down into a finished vent pocket. Insulation under the
baffle is protected against soaking or other insult, by driven weather.
I will learn to shorten nearest baffle support legs, to give a little more
room for insulation. This baffle clearance is much larger than area in
the soffit screen.

Playing Along, to Get Along?

2010-04-24T11:49:00.000-07:00

I just can't imagine the good after all, in pretending BPA and Energy Trust of Oregon have an intention other than the destruction of HB2626, in the way Portland's Clean Energy Works is now implemented. Who will pay $900 to play? In the hopeful previous post, I offered that living with programs as-implemented could bring progress. Now I have tested my advice, proceeding to the offending page.

What does a bank have to do with it anyway, hauling away $300? I don't want to help Alan Lebovitz get rich slowly by cutting down big trees on steep slopes. How does he know that a hacked slope is resilient?

A home performance test is almost always wasted at the outset of a weatherization project. Problems are found and solved by-sight. While I owned a blower door, home owners played along with mild disinterest in a useless show, where I never earned a penny or a point of goodwill. Home performance contractors don't even employ infrared thermography, where exaggerated conditions might reveal truly hidden problems. This further taking of $300 is an awful attempt to further value the wrong-headed investment some contractors have made to be both general contractor, and home inspector, in forced establishment of conflicts of interest.

Where I was involved with an Energy Trust pilot program, the testing just confused the home owner, to inaction. When I finally served that home owner and criticized Energy Trust, I was treated by Energy Trust, as incompetent. The improved conditions that relate to home valuation remain untested. I ask for independent judgement of where incompetence comes, in the piling on of tests, for no expected result or good. Isn't the piling on of tests much of the problem in run amuck healthcare, too?

The final $300 is to cover your Energy Advocate and administrative services; both of these assessment fees are generally covered by cash incentives made available through the Energy Trust of Oregon. I don't understand this statement, but see it as class warfare. "If you need a loan we don't want to serve you." There is never a fee for handling give-away of public purpose funds, in rebates. The fee makes no sense at all.

How can pilot programs exclude people with oil heat, or wood, or none?

Moving S.1574, Hyperlinked Explanation

2010-04-20T04:39:00.000-07:00

I support an email campaign to bring S.1574 out of the US Senate, Committee on Energy and Natural Resources. The following then, will be edited reference material.

People of Portland's Inner Eastside Legislative House District 42 have an involved and energetic State Representative, Jules Kopel Bailey. He has chosen to begin a political career living in and representing a neighborhood where residents can often choose a car-free lifestyle Portland is proud of. Here, there are streams of fairly-safe bicycle commuters. It is Hummer Hell. With this, you already know Jules politics.

I have noticed Jules because of his sponsorship of an alternative to regressive handout of Oregon's Public Purpose Fund. We have the common 3% "tax" in electric and gas utility bills "that goes for energy conservation, renewable resource, and low income energy programs." Many people are left out in the distribution of this money, notably renters in a drafty home whose owner is not inspired, or simply awakened, to do right. Anyone, regardless of income, can find difficulty in setting aside cash-up-front to pay that good contractor of weatherization, or even to buy materials for competent DIY. The work not happening as a result, is huge. The continuing waste of energy is shameful. Catastrophic? I think so.

The highly experienced and wannabe, qualified workers are not seeing jobs bragged-of with "recovery" funds already in the hundreds of billions. What is wrong? Why does my rebate organization see a downturn in consumer action following a free energy audit? I think Jules knows.

Jules has regular coffee shop meetings with constituents, unlike most of our representatives. I attended one six months ago, and properly stayed out of the busy conversation.

Here in Jules' own words is the inspiration of legislation that surely is more important to Oregon, than our first-state Bottle Bill. The new bill to be proud of as Oregonians, is HB2626, the Energy Efficiency and Sustainable Technology (EEAST) Act of 2009.

Did you listen to the podcast? If you live in Portland, and "can't afford" that weatherization investment that would be repaid in five years, why wouldn't you now apply to be part of the measly-so-far implementation, Portland's Clean Energy Works? If you live somewhere else, will you do your part to move forward corresponding national law? That law is drafted so far as S.1574, Clean Energy for Homes Act of 2009, introduced by my former state representative, and now US Senator, Jeff Merkley.

Oregon needs to act quickly to rescue public investment funds from the sure hazards of Wall Street.All such Oregon Treasury funds should be turned over, as incrementally drawn, to weatherization funding.

All Oregonians, and people everywhere, should do their part to advance up-front weatherization funding, by employing and improving HB2626 programs, and by getting involved with S.1574.

Oregonians should message their senators, asking for return of S.1574 from committee.
Senator Merkley
Senator Wyden

The people of Portland first, and then quickly all of us, should take part in and critique programs as they emerge.

Still Stuck on PTCS For An EPS Pilot Project

2010-04-04T10:43:00.000-07:00

I have not yet found that PTCS blessing of covering with wrap-and-goop, over a mashed, detached pipe joint. I do acknowledge more background growing from Portland, Oregon, and out to the world. I think it is odd that there isn't a more-populous hub.

Consider this find:
http://www.nwcouncil.org/rtf/supportingdata/ptcs/PTCSDuctSpecs_FY09v2_0.doc

With this current document as an example, we see all the links: Bonneville Power Administration, Regional Technical Forum, Energy Trust of Oregon, PTCS/ Ecos Consulting, all in Portland and all because Bonneville Dam near Portland, is a hub of the continuing claim of federal forces to conscience on waste of power in homes and industry. Kill salmon, and compensate.

The linked Word document is then a statement to the world, claiming BPA authority to the nation through nothing but a very-simple and sloppily-maintained database, on certain weatherization measures focused on heat pump HVAC ducting, for all utility rebate support of heating duct new-construction and weatherization. PTCS, Performance Tested Comfort Systems, taxes every wannabe duct weatherizer or trainer something like $400 for class attendance that can not really comprise their training and competence as mechanic of a heat pump or any air-convection furnace or air conditioner. It is big business for a lot of stake-claiming people with clean hands and shirts. I'm thinking there is enough money involved, unregulated by its origin from sometimes-desperate people, that we will learn interesting things about distribution, as in encouraging more utilities to join the game.

It all just hurts me.My moral antenna has been up from first thought of attending PTCS instruction. I'm sacrificing to serve the public. I will never understand who feels entitled to take money from me for sharing of secrets of duct maintenance that should be pushed hand-over-hand, to anyone.I have always known a duct blaster is useless to me in doing my good service of making attics useful. I have spoken against over-reaching proscription of UL181 foil tape, where I HAD to use it on duct joints. In reaction, I have been slow to employ much-cheaper and suitable mastic on the few joints I have assembled. I find PTCS appalling.

Now then, on to my current altercation with the whole PTCS apparatus, through my rebates manager. I want honor, not dissing, for extremely inventive and dedicated work, with much personal sacrifice. I can not melt away, giving up. So, I have studied project details, first reporting here, on new Portland-Insider offer to the world of their services with rival home rating software and a stream of auditors, of EPS, Energy Performance Score. Suspicious of tight relation to PTCS, I have declined to "vote" for PTCS as a national standard. I report a personal involvement that is quite unhappy.

Malfunction of PTCS in the reported project includes waste of two complete rounds of duct blaster and blower door tests, unrelated to present, repaired, conditions in a home. Worse, the PTCS report of duct sealing calls PASS, where there was failure. For whatever reason ducts must pass test 6.3 here, the home in fact fails. It is probably-unconscious cheating, by which leakage reduction by more than half came from resetting the detached main warm air duct dumping furnace heat to the crawl space, undetected in the first test visit. By the alternative rule 6.3.3.1, a house of 914 sf floor area should have not more than 91 CFM50 duct leakage. The twice-tested "passing" result was about 200 CFM50. I admit not seeing where leakage might be cut by half, unless the further measures I applied, in furnace interface through large leakage of the garage ceiling, were sufficient. If they were, there are very subtle things about duct blaster tests that might confuse anyone.

I am not the one with egg-on-face, who should be backing down on role in a customer deserving rebates for work excellence..

I have raised the stakes to a higher level, affirming only what I have said here, in a message to the Oregon State Senator who has recently been critical of conflicts of interest at play in my rebate organization. The subsequent day has been troubling for me. I first spent hours studying Oregon's HB 2626 for relevance to me, and becoming sobered by the complexity of progress. I think I have much to offer in something grander than Oregon's "Bottle Bill" example to the nation. It hurts to be excluded, for not being a cooperative player.

Blogging vs. Professional Conduct

2010-04-02T04:55:00.000-07:00

I allow personal needs and emotions to drive blog entries, yet feel serious restraint of professionalism as I speak through my business web page. I think the difference is in seeking of conversation through Comments. If I provoke, I may be poked back, and I want that exchange. I will try to be constructive and kind. Sometimes I will not want an exchange, because comments are indelible except by deleting a blog post. The blog author has rights and obligations in letting a topic stand, and in editing the basic post from comments.

An example of the difference is in a just-entered web site post on respirators for insulation workers. I made a similar entry in this blog more than a year ago. Someone preferred his brand. I made an embarrassing typo in a comment to the comment. And, I was off the air for that year-plus. Respirators seem to be a sensitive issue, and I may want new comments here.

PTCS Duct Sealing

2010-03-31T00:45:00.000-07:00

PTCS allows this (next photos), as a way to fix ducts, as long as the repair is preceded and followed by a duct blaster test. I read of the allowance of detachment somewhere. Wouldn't you think such an issue would be loudly presented for public debate and enforcement if PTCS were real? No. If they have something to teach, it is kept secret. My rebate organization is unhappy with my condemnation of PTCS as a mere figment of someone's imagination. A half-baked set of rules mainly demanding rote use of expensive tests, that a wary consumer will not allow. Must not pay for. Must not be paid out of funds collected for real weatherization.

My rebate organization knows better, (see DS 1.3), and a competent worker, not just "PTCS certified", would not do this. Yet my rebate organization exalts and defends PTCS and deeply hurts me financially, as a protester. I can not be regarded as a person competent to repair ducts, defending a customer's rebate claim. With my disdain of duct blasting, I am expected to call in a real PTCS person, and stay away from those mysterious ducts. I am expected to shut up, and find some other campaign and livelihood.

I have not altered the found misalignment. The applied mesh and goop were not bonded to the duct, but until someone again stepped on the obtrusive duct, it was not leaking.

The replacement of that awful duct, and others horribly in the way of storage, and in danger, does not meet PTCS requirements because I will not honor PTCS and support its tax on good trainers and technicians, by paying up and joining the "program." I then am barred from supporting a rebate application for my customer for all of the air sealing that was wanting in this home, done with meticulous, documented, reported diligence.

An unsupportable consequence to consumers of demanded performance-based weatherization (the "P" in PTCS), is that they are expected to pay the cost of multiple sets of tests argued as determining maintenance needs, when visual examination is the true guide of judgement.

People are blessed with PTCS listing, for attending classroom instruction and paying a typical amount of $400. The listing contains no test of employer or customer verification of competence. The money is so misspent, that listings are not screened for typos, and important parameters of certifications and distance from the searcher are not bothered-with.

I relented in my distancing from PTCS, for a time last November. I paid the $400 for a class, but called the instructor to advise that I intended only to at last gain revelation of taught sealing and wrapping methods, perhaps blabbing them. I would not compete with HVAC professionals, called to test in rare justified circumstances, who might have competence through frequent use a duct blaster. The instructor advised me to get my money back.

It is strange and unfair that a weatherization contractor must have a PTCS listing to claim any rebate for his customer, for diligent air sealing that has nothing to do with ducts, or even with house infiltration. The involved 300 CFM50 performance limit is especially subject to fudging of blower door results.

An answer to my frustration with twisted rebate rules, is to eliminate all rebates, where all worthy measures are simply funded up-front.

If anyone has earned a $100 rebate for duct insulation, it is in the job with reported duct reconstruction. The work includes innovative, very excellent insulation of all of the attic return-air ducts. Here is "before."

Here is "after."

I call the work innovative, because it is a first-ever-anywhere durable wrap with Johns Manville R11 Basement Wall Insulation, with a suitable tape. The tape sold with this wrap is Venture Tape 1537WMP-VR, which has chancy bonding. I think frequent bond failure is due to mold release on the wrap polypropylene skin.

I have a trusted supplier of tapes for conditioned crawl space ground covering.Vapor-Bond tape by Americover is excellent here. It even sticks reliably to slippery goop found slathered on these ducts. There the Venture tape never sticks. The Americover tape is far more convenient, since it just peels from a roll. Separating paper backing from the unsuitable tape takes a lot of care.

I want the sealing and insulation methods advocated by PTCS to be issued to the public, where they have merit. What has BPA done with public funds for weatherization, that should better instruct the public on duct sealing than this?

Duct tape! Use duct tape! Can you believe it?

Musings on Assumed Powers in Weatherization

2010-02-04T10:16:00.000-08:00

I find little comfort in my authorization to anticipate revised Energy Trust rules, that do not conform to rules expressed in the International Energy Conservation Code, IECC, published by the International Code Council.

Will a State Parks person believe me? If a policeman told me to ignore an absurd no-parking sign, would I? Energy Trust and Oregon Department of Energy are free to write their own rules, adopting or not and modifying the IECC-of-the-day (current 2009). If they will not influence ICC in the matter of service door sealing and insulation, I must try on-my-own. I have missed a June 2009 closure for changes in 2012. I will see what I can do.

Portal Rules Considered By Energy Trust

2010-02-03T19:45:00.000-08:00

I invested today in a meeting with rule experts at Energy Trust of Oregon. With promise of pending rules revision, I am told to go ahead and make/ sell >R5 portals. I will take this to mean use of maximum insulation within a structure thickness of about 2", where there is available hinge and latch hardware. I will aim for R7, with 1 1/2" EPS foam panels, 1/8" MDF facings, about 1 7/8" thickness, and a minimum of wood spacers and supports. Where I employ found manufactured attic ladders with a common 1" insulated door thickness, the claimed R5 will be sufficient.

Rules are not revised for makeshift weatherization. A crummy uninsulated ladder will have to be covered with an R10 tarp, hoping for floor sealing. There will be no interest in disparaging the "American" products. If a found kneewall closet door is weatherized, it must be gasketed, and somehow dressed with about 3 1/2" EPS foam, or fiberglass batting, to R15, but I can install my door that is ample R7. I can offer a sleek R7 two-inch thickness factory-built ceiling portal cover, but a coper with found wood or drywall covers, will need to stick on R30 insulation, somehow. If the builder of Oregon State Park cabins is called to fix floor hatches, he will be obliged to get that 4" block of urethane foam to stay on this time, somehow, and this time somehow intimate with the wood.

An aspect of this decision is doing nothing to restrict sale of junky products at lowest-possible price, the American way. Reformed quality requirements for outside doors will not apply to attic ladders. Builders may continue to throw up a piece of drywall in a ceiling-access hole, leaving a problem to be coped-with by an insulation installer, who MUST invent something. In a parallel non-correction, a handyman may continue to pocket another dollar, installing a non-IC can light, sold with no restrictions, no store-shelf warnings. I must twist the customer's arm to replace that can light at the full dollar-more cost, when I insulate that attic and refuse to use the insulation barrier suggested by Energy Trust as a preferred method.

I should be happy that I can shame the coper competition, which does not show up, at the Better Living Show. Somehow, I am not. I dearly wanted a simple R5 rule for all home service penetrations, with no special mention of attic, closet and crawl space doors.

I will take non-contradiction of this post as my rule authority.

Utility Liens

2010-02-03T01:41:00.000-08:00

In a new world of utility-supported weatherization, there will be no rebates as incentives. There will be offer of up-front financing of qualified projects, for anyone. What then is fair for those who have the means and desire, to invest their own money? By joining the program, their measures are tracked for detectable savings. There is some hassle, but it is worth it. Tracking involves some fund debit from their utility payments. Those who need the money can get up to 100%, with corresponding draw from utility bills, and they do not see the immediate benefit of the measure in monthly cash flow. Those who can do the investment themselves might choose a "Utility Lien" in up-front cash, of an amount as little as 10% of the measure cost. For all, the distribution of energy-saving investment funds, is described as a "Utility Lien." No consumer gets to keep these funds. Whatever amount they need is interest-free.

Where a project is self-funded, the money is a tax-advantaged investment. There will be advantage in self-funding as much as possible, up to 90%. The monitored investment program shields against claiming weatherization tax credits for unqualified projects. We move on from an unfair world where tax credits are the only federal offer, for people who earn too little to be taxed. We also stop abuse of tax credits, for things like pie in the sky, and tarps. For all, it is a fresh, new program. The current program has been around for years, and for some has been exhausted without completion of all now-qualifying programs.

Senator Merkley: What can we do to help?

A Cure for Tarp Madness

2010-02-03T01:24:00.000-08:00

The issue with house service and convenience features, other than outside-wall windows and doors, is to not miss opportunity to save some energy, and to not allow conditions that rot. Think of a circuit breaker panel set into an outside wall. It is a blind penetration that won't let in any life-giving light. Therefore the minimum associated weatherization is air-tightness, and total R5 for that area of the wall, to be achieved outside the panel. It stays clean and dry, at near the temperature of the conditioned space. There is a vapor barrier, that is beneficial wherever you live. In Louisiana, or Port Aransas, Texas, humid outside air is not condensing under influence of your AC. In Barrow, Alaska, the space is not below the dew point in coldest winter, and sucking down the consequences of a little household health-giving humidity.

In keeping with this intelligent diligence, I am allowed, even openly encouraged, to stop at R5 as I construct and sell attic and crawl space portals. Yes, they are air-tight. They further stop passage of humidity. No plop-batt sops. Not the site-build failure I found in a wonderful state-park cabin floor. (Please see A Failed Floor Portal, among pdf Offerings, at my web page

Tarp Madness

2010-02-02T03:22:00.000-08:00

A world of window and door tarps!

Can you imagine the wonderful opportunities for businesses like ESS and Battic, if rule-makers would herd the innocent to them, with R10, R15 or even R49 rules for all house openings. Think of all the energy to be saved!

Energy Star Attic Ladders

2010-01-30T05:18:00.000-08:00

I wonder if the rebate-organization indifference toward the wonderful attic ladders I install, insulated to R5 and better like any Energy Star rated outside door, has anything to do with lack of Energy Star rating. EPA has not bothered to consider attic ladders and portals among candidate building products.

My organization gets excited only about the tarps, which excuse continued sale of leaky and uninsulated ladders. The tarps are among home sealing products that EPA does consider, however I see no evidence any manufacturer associated with attic access is an Energy Star Partner.

I have tried an internet search of the title of this post. If I keep going down that list, I will probably find every crummy cover. I don't think I will find my industrious manufacturers in Poland, Czech Republic and Sweden, who have not claimed rating. On Day One of this post, a big-box store had an advertisement-paid high position, with no R5 attic ladder on its shelves. It seems Google has responded to fix that. Remarkable!

Diligence, Zeal, or Neither

2010-01-29T19:31:00.000-08:00

These requirements of Oregon's Energy Trust are not attainable without unjustified cost and inconvenience:

>R30 for a ceiling portal, >R15 for a wall portal, and >R10 for a drop-down ladder.

Further, they are not required by Oregon's implementation of the 2008 International Energy Conservation Code, IECC. The "real" rules say only that an outside door must be U less than 0.2, R5. The special case of an attic access is not addressed. Volunteering more-restrictive rules for a path under less thermal stress makes no sense.

There are precedents for the zeal, excused as diligence. The parent IECC seems to say:

- - - well, I can't even copy and paste. This is retyped from a read-only summary:

Section 402.2.3

Requires attic access hatches and doors from conditioned space to unconditioned space to be weatherstripped and insulated to the level equivalent to the assembly where it is located.

How mean that one must pay ICC $34 to do more than glimpse a snippet of the rules they presume to impose on the public. I wonder if ICC will now sue me for posting the paraphrased summary words without copy protection. (I started to join ICC, to at last buy and read IECC codes, last December. That failed when I could not get the no-cost pdf download that should be freely available, along with the probably-slim print copy gratis with $100 membership.)

Energy Trust of Oregon has spared me some of the sting of the IECC zeal, but remains zealous compared to Oregon Department of Energy. Some inspectors holding IECC, and some state authorities impose the full R38 or R49 floor requirement, for an attic portal. Still, I see the rules including even R10 for an attic ladder not as diligence, or zeal, but as a heedless endorsement of tarps. In majority, the public does not go along. Tarp sales are slow. I will never touch one.

Fairness, The Public Purpose Fund

2010-01-05T03:33:00.000-08:00

Oregon's Public Purpose Fund was not created as another trick to boost utility profit or to create jobs, or to promote some favored business or new green technology. A need was seen to help people to do right with power consumption for home heating (and not cooling, especially). Some people need a message, or direct help, to get weatherization done first, and then to use greener power. Only by handing out help up-front where needed, do the funds go fairly to all people. Where funds are offered only as rebates, they go only to the wise who are both thrifty and more-affluent. They need instead to go to all equally, even to the unwise. It is not fair to take money from the unwise or unfortunate, and give some back only if they have the savings or take out a home equity loan, to do the good thing. It is especially unfair to take the money in utility fees paid by renters, who have no way of getting any back.

Of course the justification to anyone of a public purpose fund, is that utilities to some degree, and all of us to a larger degree, are better off, when energy is not wasted.

An End of Rebates, A New Job for Rebate Organizations

2009-12-07T06:05:00.000-08:00

If we secure the needed investment funding in Oregon, weatherization retrofits will become just a matter of conscience and cause, with all qualifying projects funded interest-free. A flood of work will be released. Organizations employing power through handout of rebates, will be reinvented. They will find plenty of work in supervising the qualification of projects, and supervising the just conduct of the large amount of work yet to be done, to stop being a wasteful nation.

I don't think homeowners not on the edge, ever needed rebates as cause for action. It was just a matter of fairness. To not miss out on money a more clever or careful person might find. Kind of like the bargaining for low air fare. We never minded contributing to survival of our needed carrier. We just didn't want to pay more than someone else.

Now, some who have drawn rebate money as a permanent drain of the Public Purpose Fund, might wish to reinvest their energy savings to help others. That 3% tax on utility bills should accumulate hereafter, being let out only on interest-free loan. If the fund is a growing pool, it will not be seen as available for other government needs.

Clean Energy Works Portland

2009-12-04T08:23:00.000-08:00

Oregon has a very promising young politician, State Representative Jules Kopel-Bailey, serving Inner Southeast Portland neighborhoods. Through his leadership, Oregon has a new initiative for enabling weatherization in homes, enacted as the Clean Energy Fund. Listen to a Podcast here, where goals are simply expressed, in an interview conducted by Jesse Jenkins, of The Energy Collective.

Here is the enacting legislation , HB 2626 of the 2009 Oregon legislative session.

And, here is a longer "C-Engrossed" version.

Progress in this plan is at a snail pace. Here is a small public enactment within City of Portland, as Clean Energy Works. A pilot program has expired. There is nothing to apply for. Where is the commitment to action? There was one publicity posting of a pilot project in The Oregonian, as presented online here. Newer OregonLive posts brag of the pilot program.

The City of Portland is directing action at benefiting contractors, with delegation through Energy Trust of Oregon, to empower largest contractors or to low-skill general contractors who employ home performance testers, and subcontract work for profit. Everything should empower the people in need, to simply qualify projects, and do work themselves, or choose their own contractors. The big-guy testing is rarely useful in qualifying work, and is contrary to service where a conflict of interest is established. All testing should be impartial, by other organizations.

The public deserves stronger action now. This isn't about jobs. It is about getting investments done, with rapid payback in energy conservation. I think there is a special need to motivate and enable owners of rental property, where tenants suffer for lack of insulation or a crummy old furnace. Let the no-interest enabling money go to contractors and materials suppliers on behalf of, and in the service, of tenants. In an owner-occupied home, savings from lowered utility costs repay the loan. An owner of rental property will find means to pay off a ten-year loan. Up-front money is harder, and the tenants, and The Earth, suffer.

I am proud of the former Oregon State Representative for my neighborhood, now US Senator, Jeff Merkley, who offers the up-front weatherization financing nationwide, in Bill S. 1574. Oregon proudly followed British Columbia, with our Bottle Bill. This action is far more important. It WILL empower work more effectively than after-expense incentive payments. Please see more about association with HB2626, here.\

I want to be part of debates in Oregon where the legislation is acted-upon, as required, by Oregon's Department of Energy, for ALL residents.

Fire Safety and Insulation

2009-11-14T06:27:00.000-08:00

Talk of vapor retarders, linked to fire safety issues, should be followed by more independent thought on the fire safety issues. Everything in life is compromise against competing concerns. I'm proud to present a clean, physically-safe attic. Yet, I can not offer a maximum in fire safety. I'm stuck with lots of pre-existing features not open for discussion or change. Residential codes allow a bias in favor of usability and resale value, and I think that is where I am aligned. I put in clean, serviceable batt insulation, when starting with none. I don't mind a bed of rock wool or cellulose to start, leaving in-place with contribution to better fire safety, in addition to avoiding land-fill even for some dirty stuff. Cover the dusty stuff, I will, and in an attic floor, I doubt covering batts degrade fire safety.

I have taken the step of burning samples of Tenoarm and old, reject batt kraft facing, in my garage. Both do burn. The tarred kraft facing with some ready fury. The Tenoarm, not contained, sustains flame, but progressively falls out of the flame in drops of melt. I don't know how to proceed further, and leave advising to some Federal consumer-protective force.

Through a customer, I am awakened to concern for fire safety in the insulation of sloped ceilings, that connect knee wall closets with an upper attic. Such passages are found with various draft-stop provisions, more often wide open than draft-stopped. When wide open they tempt provision to moderate roof temperature, by baffling over new insulation. If roof joists are 2x4, I argue that R15 batts, pressed-down, leave sufficient breathing space, and that works even if the bottoms of the slope cavities are draft-stopped. I recently completed a new-drywall insulation placement with 2x6 roof joists, where breathing spaces were forced by DuroVent plastic baffles. Upon prompt by drywall contractors, I must reduce the applied insulation from R21, to R15. I may instead argue that the spaces should be draft-blocked, removing the baffles.

I wish a blog or some other internet forum might moderate discussion toward appropriate compromises.

Vapor Retarder Two-Thirds Rule

2009-11-12T21:02:00.000-08:00

When placing insulation in Portland, Oregon, I rarely use material with a bonded-on vapor retarder (kraft face). I am aware of propaganda favoring cellulose, and raising fear of fiberglass batts, in The Big Burn Video. Proponents of cellulose have dealt with criticism of organic cellulose as inherently less safe than inorganic mineral insulation, and tilt the table too far in the other direction. The video presents ideal cellulose, and fiberglass with no description. I imagine the fiberglass was a least-favorable setting, with air channels (chimney path) the length of flammable kraft facing. A fair comparison would have fiberglass totally filling joist bays, with no kraft facing.

I will never use kraft facing in a wall or in a new-construction ceiling. There I use complete, taped sheathing with polyethylene sheeting designed for the purpose, Swedish Tenoarm. Aside from fire safety concern, I save time and get better fit, in custom-cutting unfaced batts. I also follow the advice of the USA importer of Tenoarm:

http://www.conservationtechnology.com/building_design.html.

I will use kraft batts in an attic floor, to isolate new material from found loose-fill insulation. I use original reasoning in study of dew point data for my location, as reviewed in this posting, with a current update. The commonly-understood two-thirds rule states that a vapor retarder should be to the warm side of two thirds of the applied insulation.

Beginning Thoughts of Math, Carbon Footprint

2009-10-29T17:22:00.000-07:00

In effort to show the value of home energy conservation efforts, I have done math for heat transfer, and fuel costs crunched for my city. Now, I want to join the game of declaring benefits as reduction of carbon footprint. An advantage in this is that low, subsidized, cost of heating fuel is divided out. I accept numbers from a recent issue of National Geographic, March 2009, p 67:

Driving: a gallon of gasoline adds 19.6 lb CO2.

One KWh electric use adds 1.5 lb CO2.

100 cf of natural gas emits 12 lb CO2.

I need to back up a few steps, and understand where I am expected to go, with reduction employing such numbers. Start with the EPA Household Emissions Calculator.

Here is my annual carbon footprint, living alone, working hard as a weatherization contractor:

12,438 pounds CO2 in driving 13,400 miles per year.

2,808 pounds CO2 for 239 therms of natural gas in an efficient furnace heating my modest 1000 sf home and productive workplace.

7,063 pounds of CO2 to generate 7663 KWH of electricity per year.

22,309 pounds CO2 before savings efforts volunteered, about 1000 pounds of CO2, through car maintenance and through steadfast recycling.

Numbers correspond fairly well with the National Geographic conversions. I am near the 20,750 per-person US average. I have begun to share my home, and that will push me below the average. The sharing of my home is in fact the most powerful thing I can do.

Better-educated by this study, I am inspired to save a few thousand pounds of CO2 emissions per year. Here are several ways I could save 1000 pounds: Drive less by 8%, fifty gallons, or 1080 miles. Reduce electricity use by 14%. Reduce my use of natural gas for heating, by a harder-to-do 35%, or 85 therms. There is promise in all of these. Only heating reduction through conservation, what I do for others as a contractor, is painless.

I began this writing exercise upon concluding that large effort in a customer's attic of 720 sf, going from R13 to R40, would save fifty therms, the equivalent of using thirty gallons in driving, and about 600 pounds of CO2 averted. It was a small gain, but beyond painless. It is a more than twenty percent annual return on the customer's investment, forever, and further value in more-comfortable living. The customer will still look for harder ways to reduce footprint. The saving corresponds also to that of diligent use of clothes lines in a wet climate; this with no effort.

Free Access to Codes

2009-10-12T05:08:00.000-07:00

In a previous post, I expressed my wish that all public regulations important to my safe workmanship, should be available for free online access. I am pleased to find that the National Electric Code, maintained by NFPA, the National Fire Protection Association, can be read online. You only need to register for access. There is no cost. I wish it were word-searchable and printable. If it were pdf, I could readily enlarge for less challenge in reading.

Now, how about building codes?

Sealing Attic Floor Pits

2009-09-05T06:06:00.000-07:00

Dropped ceilings in closets are seen in an attic, as floor pits. Photos here, with corrective action, are of a home built in 1953. Attic air is freely admitted to walls the full height of rooms below, amplifying the ceiling-area heat loss or gain, by an order of magnitude. Let's try the math here, on that order of magnitude. Numbers in play are represented by L and W, the dimensions of the ceiling, and H, the below room height. I see that the influence of closet interior walls is debateable where the door is normally closed. Figure the amplified area as 2* (L + W) *H, where L = 46, W = 31 and H = 96. 2* (L + W) *H = 103 sq ft. LW = 9.9 sq ft. The amplification factor is 10.4. If insulating 9.9 sq ft saves $7/ yr, the larger saving is $73/ yr.

Carry the argument of an order-of magnitude multiplier a bit further. For this closet, if the door were left open, the area exposed to attic-room temperature difference increases by the interior side-wall area below the drop. The larger amplification factor is 13.5. The smaller amplification factor, (2* (L + W) *H) / LW, is a minimum for home situations. I imagine home situations where the minimum is larger than 10.4. How about a long, deep wall used as a ventilation chase? Ten ft long, a foot deep. The amplification factor for a one-floor 8-ft chase is 17.6. If the chase runs down two floors, 16-ft, the amplification factor is 35.

I argue to my rebates manager, that pit closure is far more important than air sealing opportunities in an attic floor. Pits are often overlooked or are improperly fixed when found. Old insulation may be draped over a pit, merely hiding it, with slight impediment to air flow driven by the temperature gradients. A loose-fill installer will almost never know of the neglect. There are no incentives to pick up that old, dirty insulation to find and fix pits or other problems, in practice. In my area the testing trade, Home Performance, is promoted by a fifty percent of cost rebate for air sealing work if that achieves quite-large drop of infiltration, 300 cfm or more under test conditions. That is absolutely unhelpful here. The problems are not made detectable by blower-door conditions of pull from the attic. A pit doesn't contribute to infiltration.

My closure of the pit employs half-inch drywall pulled up to floor joists, and edge-sealed with spray foam. I prefer GP Densarmor fiberglass-faced drywall, kept as scrap from my closet projects. Screw a length of 2x4 under the drywall for lifting and anchoring. Sandwich the drywall with another 2x4. I shape Densarmor edges with a Shurform plane. Ordinary drywall is too brittle, and paper facing resists trimming of edges.

This relatively simple pit closure took more than an hour of actual performance. With an extra trip it is far more costly to an installer, if not known in advance and rewarded through a contract. If a contract change must be argued or if the worker is somehow detached from responsibility, a proper fix is not mere due diligence. It is unlikely to happen.
This home was like a test lab for pit sealing. A rare opportunity, yet daunting since problems were detected upon bidding. Daunting since more time would be spent in the attic in summertime heat. Daunting since pulling drywall up under floor joists requires more than a bit of cleverness.
There were three more pit areas, one including a dropped ceiling over a bathtub; another a long wall with dead volume associated with a grand fireplace; and another very simple at a dropped ceiling over the home entry. That at the fireplace involved working in extremely cramped overhead, out to an outside wall, and had six hours of actual performance. Multiple visits dealt with rerun of interfering wires. All of these problems were happily hidden, until I pulled up nice-looking insulation.
I challenge Energy Trust of Oregon, and other rebate organizations, to do a better job of serving and protecting Utility consumers. All stuations that invite being overlooked, should be specifically reported by weatherization contractors, to secure diligence rebates. I ask for a new rebate program, where reported pit closure qualifies rebate-times-ten for involved floor area. All diligence rebates should be presented for public examination and learning. This reward approach is consistent with the fact that some pits are large enough that pit walls could be insulated instead of making a difficult but fall-protective cover. The alternative reward of fifty percent of repair cost is of comparable size, and would work if the conflicted tie to reward those invested in Home Performance, were removed. Keeping the tie here is absurd, yet that is the dogged position of Energy Trust of Oregon. Keeping the tie is a grave disservice to homeowners. While I owned a blower door, modestly invested in Home Performance, I NEVER found a problem not more-readily detected by simple observation. I never found a home without a great excess of infiltration, to be dealt with by progressive and obvious measures such as window replacement. Tests taught nothing.

Here is related comment upon feedback to focus on unique and interesting opportunities, and to raise the state of the art in weatherization. At the last Energy Trust Trade Ally meeting I attended, I shouted out that blower door testing for unique purposes should be rewarded directly to the contractor, a token amount of $50, if he offers a report of why and what learned for PUBLIC DISCLOSURE. A family of public reports would raise the state of the art among contractors nationwide, would inform the DIY public, and would sell Home Performance services. We all need to better imagine the situations where blower door and/ or infrared thermography testing profits the homeowner. The situations may be uncommon.

Using Baffles With Attic Batt Insulation

2009-08-27T21:11:00.000-07:00

This is a one-foot length of Durovent baffle material, held against roof sheathing by batt insulation stuffed beneath. Placing the top-course crossing batts goes faster, and I get more insulation at the periphery, when I don't have to worry about blocking vents.

Access Done

2009-08-05T05:27:00.000-07:00

With a hole in the wall, the problem is manageable.

I have improved ceiling insulation to R40, over 80 sq ft, and the accessible areas of the cut knee wall to R15. After rebates, despite access cost, the job cost will be repaid by energy savings, in less than ten years. For the homeowner, it is one more thing to feel good about.

The real-plaster patch is another art that needs promotion.

Access, and Insulation

2009-08-05T04:23:00.000-07:00

The light at the floor aims at a difficult insulation opportunity, behind finished knee walls.

Let's see what is behind this crude door.

A conscientious installer of cellulose insulation made a best effort to weatherize the ceiling of the home Living Room. Coverage is a spotty twenty percent, with none in the lee of obstructions.

Some day I will fix this, from a new, better access. Attic Access is what I do, and that involves willingness to cut and crawl through plaster walls. I have done this. (next post)

Recycling Extruded Polystyrene Foam, (Styrofoam)

2009-05-24T15:32:00.000-07:00

This post is edited as of November 7, 2009.

EPS foam blocks (Styrofoam) ARE recyclable, in Portland, Oregon. Recycling, of clean material only, is a service of Pacific Land Clearing, at three of their four locations in metro Portland.

http://www.plcrecycling.com/centers.html

This Bee Newspaper review, tells the story, as of June 4, 2008, with info on what PLC does with the styrofoam. Reported options include a volunteered service of the seasonal Moreland Farmers Market, which brings a weekly collection to PLC.

I find styrofoam stored in attics, often. Stored. Not really doing any good as insulation, where air freely seeps under. I collect material in a 55-gallon drum liner, and when full, make a trip to a PLC location. I want my city to require all recycling centers to accept material, and bring it to PLC. As noted in The Bee, the mindset that styrofoam must go with trash, is hard to undo.

Every city should look for means to consume styrofoam as done by PLC and as described in The Bee.

PTCS Air Sealing? I Sold My Blower Door.

2009-05-22T01:52:00.000-07:00

The meaning of the acronym PTCS, is Performance Tested Comfort Systems. This resides at ptcsnw.com, which is maintained in Portland, Oregon, by Ecos Consulting. PTCS has been a bugaboo to me. Oregon Department of Energy has delegated its training responsibility for weatherization contractors, to ptcsnw/ ECOS. That responsibility currently is carried out by instruction through Energy Trust, in sealing HVAC ducts, and installing heat pumps. These classes are motivated for a large number of weatherization contractors, by Energy Trust of Oregon rebate requirements (see end of this post). Useful skills will be taught in the classes, but they should not qualify anyone and everyone, to work as HVAC specialists. I would not ever compete for that work, but would refer a real specialist that I trust. I don't want to invest in the HVAC instruction, for a couple of reasons:

First, there is substantial cost of about $1000, my time of two full days in class, and a $400 tuition. If the instruction really is important to people I serve, the tuition should be rebated somehow as reward for my unpaid dedication to my community. My costs are in the thousands of dollars, for unrewarded bid visits and telephone advice, often surpassing what a paid auditor offers a homeowner. I think the knowledge of PTCS that should matter to me as I make attics useful, whatever it is, is in the public domain, and should be accessible online. All paid people are ultimately funded by taxes, here a 3% addition to natural gas and electricity bills. Anyone, not just paying contractors, should get back more than one-time rebates for conservation measures. There should be no obstacles between public-domain knowledge, and the public, anyone, who might have use of that knowledge. The gripe is similar to what I feel about codes turned over to publishers, to make a profit. I will pay for nicely-bound code documents, but expect to find them in online pdf form, for free download. There should be no barrier of access, to things in the public domain, that I need to know.

Second, I know that the instructor of Ecos/ ptcsnw duct sealing classes, has stated in a Home Energy Magazine article here, that duct sealing with wrap-and-goop is objectionable to many workers, and that foil-faced double-backed butyl tape I have reported finding useful, is good. 2009 Energy Trust Specifications, at DS 1.5, ban the foil tape except on air handlers. I can not accept that I have done wrong in my employment of Polyken Foilmastic 367-17. I have protested the Energy Trust rule. One application I am absolutely proud of, is the joining of flexible heating ducts to a steel collar insufficiently smaller than the duct ID. I have achieved secure coupling in several homes, where ducts were detached, by slitting the duct in 120 degree sectors, applying 367-17 to the ID tightly-smoothly-generously, to form a bell. I then wrapped the improved duct and collar in OD application of 367-17. I challenge anyone to do this repair with wrap-and-goop. If I am in rebellion, I can not attend the class.

I have not invested in the tools of real HVAC professionals, including a duct blaster and other more-complex equipment. I bought a blower door last August, but just sold it. I only bought the blower door, to support customers with air-sealing-achievement rebates. Thankfully, such rebates have been eliminated in Oregon. I do not wish to compete dishonestly with the real HVAC professionals, or with professionals engaged daily as Home Performance testers. Home Performance testing demands daily practice, and investment in all tools, including all elements of Energy Conservatory products, and infrared thermography equipment. I am sad that my buyer, a general contractor like me, intends to delegate testing work to an employee, also not a dedicated professional, and to snag general contracts through the aura of holistic treatment of a home. General takes cuts on Subs. I don't do that. I want the homeowner to independently choose best contractors for all work. No cuts out of the homeowner's pocket. Home Performance testing is a summary task, after obvious things have been fixed. Get a greenness score for real estate purposes, and be sure a home is not too tight. One need not do testing, to imagine big measures of weatherization, HVAC upgrades, thorough crawl space ground barrier sealing and radon mitigation including heat-recovery ventilation.

There are strong emotions, perhaps mostly relief, in selling the blower door, though it had been sitting idle in my living room, tying up capital. I had been refused an air-sealing rebate in an oil-heated home subject to Oregon Department of Energy rebates, for want of PTCS certification. In the job, I patched visible, large holes, including a car-bashed garage wall, not found through another contractor's blower door test. That was not work for an HVAC professional. I promised to sell the blower door, if ODOE would not deal with this irrationality. Another bump to emotions over blower-door irrationality is in performance testing as a BASIS for duct sealing. (The PT in PTCS, taken to excess.) Energy Trust allows a rebate for duct wrapping, only if the ducts have been tested (with a duct blaster). Duct sealing and duct wrapping rebates hereafter apply only to work done by PTCS-trained HVAC technicians. In many homes, the entirety of a home's HVAC ducting is visible in a crawl space or attic. An insulation installer can know that ducts are intact, and could wrap them with opportune timing, but that is banned.

HVAC ducts should not be allowed to leak, but Energy Trust allows leaks to be deliberately maintained, if needed to achieve minimum fresh-air exchange, 7 ACH or greater at 50pa. See the requirement here , at AS 1.62. If one wants more fresh air, do it intelligently, with an HRV installation! Other absurdities are brought in, with the campaign to sell PTCS training. I will be out of this business, until it is fixed. If I find a detached duct, I will assuredly re-connect it, and might foil-tape it. Shame on me. No rebate. None deserved. Failed to test? Punish me.

Duct Joining and Sealing with Mastic

2009-03-17T06:41:00.000-07:00

Duct sealing can be done at lowest material cost, and with assured complete air tightness, using a two-part tape method, or a simple brush-on or spray-on of mastic. This photo shows one duct element solidly installed with materials I judge to be Hardcast Two-Part: RTA adhesive, and DT 5300 mineral-gypsum-compound-impregnated fiber tape. A two-part joint has alignment strength that is comparable to that with Foilmastic tape, but stable alignment must be achieved by other means, before tape application. The method was easily applied where a small-diameter duct was at rest on blocks. Brush-on mastic has its place where duct joints are not under bending stress. Mastic covering is not suitable where a duct must be lifted for subsequent insulation wrapping.

Hardcast materials are conveniently available at GENSCO.

Duct Joining and Sealing With Foilmastic Tape

2009-03-16T07:00:00.000-07:00

What is an insulation installer to do, if a customer has not found and hired a competent HVAC mechanic, to fix defective ducts, in advance of his work? I gamely did what had to be done, in this first trial of methods. A 16" diameter return-air duct has been re-routed, with some new, stronger ducts and elbows. Several detached joints were made stable, and were locked and sealed using Nashua Polyken 367-17 Foilmastic UL 181B-FX listed tape. GENSCO will be a good supplier of all elements of the job. No one offfered me a wrap and goop method, and I would have found that unsuitable here. I needed to progressively, experimentally and securely assemble the ducts. Wrap and goop is both too permanent and too insecure.

Foilmastic is useful for all joining and sealing of solid ducts. It is also useful as a means of flaring and stabilizing a flexible duct where it joins a solid duct. This flexible duct was not large enough to engage the steel duct. I cut 120 degree “flaps” that were drawn over the steel ducts, with good control of engagement. I taped the flaps down with a couple of full turns of 3” foil tape. A full round or two of poly-skrim-kraft tape completes the mating with insulating wrap. Several dollars of tape are involved. It is worth it.

A crawl space might incude a large number of supply-side ducts of variable diameter, with perhaps a need of detachability for access. I note the following in a 1996 report:

Duct mastic works, although cold and wet weather make it difficult to apply.
Workers don't like mastic. It ruins clothes and tools, especially when users are novices.
Tape-applied mastic seals well. These are the aluminum tapes with 15-mil butyl backing.
Air handlers are leaky.

These duct elements had been bound with duct tape, which of course was dried out and detached. Joints were stable but not secure. There were no leaks more significant than that occurring at the elbow joints. Foilmastic is used to assure joining strength, and sealing was not the first objective. If simple sealing were the objective, brush-on mastic would do, and all joints should be painted. Here, near the crawl apace entrance and with relatively good head room, Foilmastic was not the only choice. Please see the next posting.

Conditioned Crawl Space, First Experiment

2009-01-09T06:38:00.000-08:00

In a very three-dimensional crawl space, with a trench and a gas furnace, Visqueen, 6-mil poly, whatever the cheap covering commonly available, does not suffice.

Here is a trial of 16-mil reinforced polyethylene called Goldentouch, from Americover. The material is superior to that offered by Basement Systems.

All seams are strongly attached and sealed with tough 1 1/2" width double-back butyl tape. Topside overlap is dressed with 4" width "vapor bond" sealing tape, matching the tough Goldentouch white vinyl.

The material cost here was about $500.