It’s hard enough to control humidity in humid climate homes when they’re just built to code these days. The air conditioner traditionally has handled the dehumidification, but increasing requirements for insulation and air tightness affect the sensible load more than…
The 9th annual North American Passive House Conference happened two weeks ago in the San Francisco Bay Area of California. The Passive House Institute US (PHIUS) has been holding this conference every year since 2006, and it just keeps getting…
A home energy rating is supposed to tell you how energy efficient your home is. A certified home energy rater goes to the home and collects all the data relevant to energy consumption in the home (well, all the data…
The 9th annual North American Passive House Conference is less than a month away. You knew it's going to be in California, right? It's unfortunate that the other passive house group has chosen to use the same name PHIUS has…
The 9th annual North American Passive House Conference will be in San Francisco, California on 10-14 September 2014. Confused? Maybe you heard that the North American Passive House Conference will be in Portland, Maine on 22-23 September. What's going on…
ASHRAE† is meeting in Denver this week, and my friend Robert Bean, the mastermind behind the Healthy Heating website, tweeted the other day that they're going on a tour of NREL's new net zero energy building. I'd love to go—both…
![Coal-fired Power Plant [by Stanze, From Flickr.com]](jpg/coal-fired-power-plant.jpg)
When does saving one of anything ever result in actually saving three or four? When we're talking about electricity, of course. The reason is simple: Most of our electricity comes from the burning of fuels like coal and natural gas.…
Mirror, mirror, on the wall, what's the greenest product of all? You can find lists of the best green building products all over the web, and many sites update them annually. When looking for hot green building products, you have…
Smart people in the home-building industry have a saying about codes: A code-built house is the worst house allowed by law. The implication behind that statement is that if all you're doing is meeting the code, you're probably short-changing the…
The Passive House Institute of the US (PHIUS) had a real presence at the RESNET conference this week. I felt it even before I got on the plane to Austin last Saturday, as I met John Semmelhack of Think Little…