Zero Waste

A walk down Bea Johnson's Path to Sustainable Living.

Life Without A Trashcan: A Look Inside the Zero Waste Home

Bea has managed to reduce her family's garbage YEARLY output to the mason jar.  She does this by generally buying in bulk and using her own glass or cloth containers.

This is truly impressive and a example to try and follow.  While I have reduced the waste, that goes to landfills, in my home to about 2-3 garbage bags a year, I do end up with a LOT of packaging that must be recycled each week.  I will buy her book and try to start incorporating some of her ideas in my lifestyle going forward.

Removing Hardwood Floors - The easy (ier) way!

One of the tasks I was not looking forward to in the demo of our existing house was the task of pulling up the approx 650 sq.ft. of hardwood floor.  I had done some of this in the past and it was a bear.  It is murder on your back and takes for ever.

I put about 2-1/2 hours into it yesterday and did about a foot by 40 ft.  Each row was taking 5-7 minutes and based on this rate the whole living and dinning room (only part of the job) was going to take me 19+ hours.  I started again this morning and after a few rows I was second guessing my decision to save the floors. 

My back is already not the best and I knew that I was not going to last doing this the traditional way.  Almost any example you see of pulling a hardwood floor that has been nailed down uses the following tools.

Typical tools used to take up a hardwood floor.

But I had vowed on this project that I would work smarter and not harder.  I decided to 'waste' half an hour going to the lumber store to see if there was any better options.  Boy am I glad I did.  I ended up buying a 6 lb sledge on a 36" handle and a pick/axe.  Now you may be wondering how these two could work together.  They can't untill you modify them.

The beginnings of a beautiful thing.

 But by cutting off the pick, you are left with a lovely flat spot to whack the 'axe' in under the tongue on the flooring.

Finished tools work very well together

This cut the time per row down to under 2 minutes or a savings of apprx. 70%

 
This example took just under 4 minutes.  I was able to hone the method down to around 2 minutes per row.

A panel lifter is also useful but in the end, I just used my modified tool to do everything.

 The following is a time lapse of the entire floor removal.  As you can see, the timing spead up considerably with the new tools in hand.


I found that working on the individual pieces from the middle of the piece was the most effective to lifting it out. Often the grove side joint broke, but these will be easily added back with a router. And considering the increase in speed this method afforded, the extra work to put new ends on some of the boards was well worth it.  I will now look to find a labourer to grind off all of the protruding staples (I believe this will be much faster than trying to pull out with pliers).

Thanks For Stopping by.

Batt Insulation - Not all are poor!

Gregory La Vardera posted this excellent primer over at Green Building Adviser on the differences between fibreglass and mineral wool batts.

As Gregory points out, ROXUL Mineral Wool batts are not associated with the typical failings of a fibreglass batt installation. This is due to the density of the product and the ease of cutting and trimming. The product also sheds water and is fireproof.

My only critique of his article is is statement "I don't need my insulation to make an air seal, because I used that good ol' housewrap on the outside. Nope, nothing wrong with housewrap — but it provides no help with the air sealing you need at your vapor retarder. The air seal in this case wants to be on the warm side of the wall, to prevent interior moisture from entering the wall cavity and condensing during the winter heating season."

This is actually incorrect, an air barrier ANYWHERE in the assembly will block air flow through the assembly.  I will talk more about this in an upcoming blog entry.  For now, I did not want to detract away from the rest of the posters review of ROXUL mineral wool insulation.

Determining Lifespan - Updated to 50+ yrs

Back in June (previous post), I wrote about the need to determine the probable lifespan of a building in order to determine the backpack for energy efficiency upgrades and determining the embodied energy of the dwelling.

I wrote that unfortunately, I suspected that the life span for my new dwelling could be as little as 20 years and that I would use 25 years as my expected horizon.

Well I am pleased to advise that I have now significantly extended the time line based on conversations I have had with the outgoing and new District planners for my area.  The following factors weighed in on the discusion:

• The neighbourhood has limited vehicle access with two 'exits' for approximately 700 homes and as such would not be suitable for densification.
• The current owners in the neighborhood are VERY active and vocal and would not support the addition of multifamily into the neighbourhood.
• District is considering allowing for Lane Way and Carriage houses for our neighbourhood instead.
• The real estate values in our neighbourhood are just too high (lots start at $800K and quickly climb.  My lot, at just over 10K sqft, is assessed at over $1M for just the dirt).

So it appears I may have underestimated the 'bastion' mentality and reality of my neighbourhood, and it is going to stay pretty much as it is now for some time to come. I actually welcome this news, as it was a bit disheartening thinking the dwelling may be torn down in aas little as 20 years.

Is this revised time line going to change the way I build? Probably not, the reality is that determining the sweet spot for say insulation levels, requires modelling that I just do not have the experience, time, or money to do right now.  I am instead, going to go with my gut based on research I have done over the last 1-5 years, and on recommendations done by bodies like Building Science Corp.  Once the house is built, and I am able to determine energy use by actual consumption, and learn to use various modelling programs, I will then crunch the number and report back at how close I got to the sweet spot (the sweet spot for me is when the cost of adding site energy generation is cheaper than further reducing energy use).

Stay tuned!

We have an engineer!

As regular readers will know (previous discussion on the topic), I have struggled to find the right structural engineer for my project for a very long time now.  

The process started last March when I chose someone who had a structural issue with 2x4 framing and wanted to put an 8" concrete core inside an ICF.  On the first rear day of activity, he thankfully advised this was not the job for him, something I was in total agreement with.  But this left me in a real pickle, as I initially had planned on starting construction this last spring.  After frantic calls to other engineers showed that no one would be available on short notice, my wife and I discussed and decided that putting the project off a year made the most sense (I did not want to start any later than May 1 in order to get the roof on before the October rains).  And in hindsight, I was no where near ready to start this year anyway and had a lot of technical challenges that still needed to be worked through. So all in all, the delay has been for the best.

Because, I had been 'full tilt' for several months up to the March debacle, I used the decision to delay a year as an excuse to 'take a break'.  The problem is that a break becomes far too comfortable and weeks very soon turn into months.  The last 'break' I had been on took a year!  Fortunately I was a bit more disciplined this time and started the design engine up again in late May.  I received a list of ICF friendly engineers through my good buddy Murray Frank, and started contacting each of them to see if they had the time to fit in my project.  I was finding that between people that did not do ICF anymore, were totally out of business, did not do residential, were not interested, or just did not have the time, my options were limited.

I settled on fellow recommended by people on my first list, who promised a 2-3 week turnaround when I met in his office, but after 6 weeks, not only had we not started, but he had never returned a call or email.  I thought, if we start out this way, how long is it going to take to finish the task and decided to cut my losses before I wasted any more time.

I then contacted some of the people that were previously too busy and some new names I had been given.  I was left with 3 or 4 people willing to take on the work, but based on their own terms.  This generally meant they wanted to take over complete control of the design and move all structure out of Part 9 of the BC Building Code (A prescriptive path to construction) and into Part 4 (An engineered path for all structure).  I just needed assistance on items I could not meet prescriptively like beam sizing and engineered floor and roof trusses, and of course the ICF foundations (and only those because I am a bit higher than the prescriptive code allows for).  The all encompassing engineers wanted to do up pages of detail drawings and in some cases even choose the products I was to use.  And they wanted to charge me $15K+ for the privileged! (my original engineer from March quoted $2500).  This was my design, I had already drawn it up in both 2D AND 3D.  I had already drawn up many of the details I wanted to figure out before building to ensure they worked and were buildable.  I knew what I wanted to build and knew how to build it.

The problem with Part 4 is also that it was going to cost me a lot more money to build. For instance, the Part 9 prescriptive approach requires very little if any manufactured anchors for braced wall panels.  As long as you have the right volume of panels per floor, you can use conventional framing with plywood and everyday nails to build these panels, whereas the Part 4 system often make exclusive use of the Simpson StongTie anchors and rods.  These can add thousands to a typical build.   I had already designed the dwelling to the Part 9 Seismic requirements and did not need any assistance in this regard.

I DID NOT NEED THIS PREMIUM SERVICE and in fact most of this effort would have just been wasted!  I could also tell, that preserving the integrity of my design and my ideas for thermal bridge reduction was going to be difficult with several of the individuals.

So at the end of August I threw a 'Hail Mary' and contacted a name I had received from Durisol (ICF block manufacturer) back in March.  I had originally dismissed the name because they worked out of Guelph Ontario and I thought how is this ever going to work?.  But I was desperate and so contacted Nathan Proper of Tacoma Engineers and was thrilled in his responses.  He advised that he had a BC stamp and that we could arrange any Building Official required inspections with a local engineer at a very reasonable cost.

He further advised "We would be happy to be involved with your house and to help you out by designing the components which need our design. The approach we normally take with these items is to design only the specific items which the owner asks us to --- these are commonly the items which are not covered by Part 9 of the building code.  This is more cost-effective for the owner than checking every little item." 

I thought I had died on gone to heaven, and my neighbour came out to ask why I was running around the front yard hooping and hollering.  The news literally brought me a few tears as I was so relieved after the conversations I had had with others over the last 6 months.  I had hit the jackpot!  There apears to be a dramatic difference in how the design professionals here operate compared to back east (I have often seen this with other construction related items as well).  The best part - they would charge $5K for the basic design package!

Nathan and his team have been responsive, approachable, and co-operative with my goals and ideals.  They approach the tasks in a straightforward, logical, AND practical matter.  They are also sensitive to my budget constraints and have already made suggestions where I can provide input (drawing) instead of utilizing staff in their office.  We only started the real work on  Tuesday, but I feel we have already made great progress.  I came up with a concept for supporting my sun shade assemblies, and a lot of people I am sure would just ignored my suggestions and done their own thing (often at my increased cost).  But they ran with it and advised it should work and that they had done something similar previously.  I can now be a constructive part of the team instead of a bystander, which is what I had always been looking for.

So, it goes to show, trust your gut.  If something does not feel right, it probably isn't and should be fixed or past over. It took a long time, but I KNOW I have found the right person for the project and will be enhanced by their involvement.

And is that not what you are looking for when you are hiring someone to help you build your house?  

AutoCad 2D model of a 3 level single family home.

Ever wonder what a completed model of a 2D three level home prepared in AutoCAD 2002 with all 43 layers turned on at once looked like?

Thought so!

Finished 2D model ready to send to the engineer.  Kind of frightening knowing each line had to be created manually.

Getting Closer!

Working on finalizing drawings for the structural engineer on Tuesday (more on finding an engineer in the days ahead). LONG days over the last week to get finished. Had some real problems balancing roof insulation levels, cost, weight, and neighbourhood bylaw roof height. John at Alliance Truss helped A LOT! Finished the 3D model tonight and now just need to update the 2D AutoCAD model to pass off to the engineer Tuesday morning. Hopefully no surprises and we can apply for permits at the end of the month!

I am using Home Designer Pro to create my 3D model.  It automatically creates the framing once you draw the walls.  This can be both a blessing and a curse.  A lot of times the program is too smart for its own good and you have to figure out why it is putting a piece of wood sticking our the middle of your roof.  But it is certainly faster than drawing all by hand and the program does a great job of identifying where you have conflicts.

Blackberry gave up hours ago and was snoring until I took the picture.

XPS vs. EPS - Which holds up better in a below grade environment?

To reduce thermal bridging through your slab on ground, it is generally best practice to insulate below your slab.  This becomes even more important when you have hydronic heating pipes running through the concrete slab, as they increases the temperature differential between the slab and soil below increase the rate of heat flow out of the dwelling down into the ground (how much insulation to place below your slab is also under debate and will be discussed on future postings).

EPS rigid foam insulation is commonly used below slabs due to its relatively low cost compared to XPS, however, many in the building science community recommend XPS for its water resistance properties and ability to retain R Value.  Based on ASTM C272 tests, XPS has generally exhibited more resistance to moisture abortion when compared to EPS, but the EPS industry feels the ASTM tests are too short (24 hours/48 hours/and 30 days) and that EPS is actually better are resisting water take-up over XPS long term.

The EPS industry bases their claims on a singe case study performed by a EPS foam company (ACH Foam Case Study) that showed that after 15 years the EPS foam was dryer and retained more of its thermal resistance than XPS in the same environment.  The problem with this case study is that it was performed by a party with invested interest in the outcome, and as a result has very little credibility within the building envelope community.

SENWiEco will try to provide conclusive non-biased results as to whether EPS or XPS is the better choice for below grade installations based only on water absorption and thermal resistance properties (we will not discuss cost or embodied energy of the products). We will also included foam glass in the testing, as it is starting to receive attention on high performance homes with a desire to reduce embodied energy of the insulation products.

To this end, we today started a test that involves monitoring samples of each material in the following conditions:

• Buried below grade in a location that will see regular ground water
• Submerged in a water bath
• Sealed in an airtight zip-lock bag
• Stored in indoor conditioned space on a shelf.

At the end of approx 6 months, the samples will be re weighted to determine the volume of moisture absorbed and also sent to BCIT where they will be tested (ASTM C518 conductivity test) to determine their thermal resistance properties after aging the samples in the various conditions listed above.

Proof the selected site will definitely see ground water.  This was the result after a heavy rain approx 3 days prior.

Samples cut and place in bottom of hole (approx 4ft depth

Gravel added to ensure water can flow around samples and to identify location when dug out in spring.

Samples tucked away for the winter.

Samples to be held under water

Extra pieces of foam to push test samples under water

Lid of test chamber strapped on to keep samples submerged.  Have also now taped seams to prevent evaporation (not shown in photo).

Samples stored in air tight zip-lock bags.

Samples stored on office shelf

We would like to express our gratitude to the following sponsors of this testing:

PlastiFab (EPS)
Pittsburgh Corning (Foam Glass)
Home Depot (Discounted XPS)

Temporary Accommodation Road blocks!

As part of my desire to direct our budgeted monies toward a high performance home, I had always planned to request permission to live on site in a large vacation trailer (something like this).  Rent in my region is expensive, with 1 bedroom basement suites renting for $1100/month.  With an expected build time of 18 months, the avoidance of rent would allow $20k+ to be redirected to important components like windows and insulation. Instead, I could buy a trailer for $20k-$25K and then sell it when we were done for $5K less, resulting in a $5K living costs for the 18 months.

Two obstacles have been working against this plan from the beginning and it turns out both were insurmountable.

When I approached the District of North Vancouver in March, I was told this just was not done, with the manager citing safety concerns for the occupants of the trailer as well as the District services.  This lead to investigation with BC Safety Authority (advised no jurisdiction in North Van, but a pretty common situation in rural building lots) and WorkSafeBC (advised no concerns beyond siting trailer in area where debris could not fall of the dwelling under construction and onto the roof of the trailer.  The District manager had also sited concern for neighbour complaints, so I petitioned and received support for 4 of the 5 effected neighbours (three in writing) with no response from the 5th neighbour.  I went back recently to the District with all of this additional information only to now be told that "A zoning bylaw prohibition cannot be varied" which I am not sure I understand because many other aspects of the zoning bylaw like roof height, setbacks, etc, can be varied under special circumstances.  I tried to make a case for making this a test, because the District council are always looking for ways to make building more affordable in the District to allow those that have grown up here to stay here once they move out of the family house. I am also aware that the planning staff are soon to be proposing alteration of the neighbourhood zoning bylaw to allow lane-way carriage houses (which would further support a 'second' accommodation on the property).  The mistake I made was asking in the first place.  You see, there have been other owners in my neighbourhood that have lived in a trailer during their build.  The difference is that they did not ask and no one complained, so the District was not forced into action.  Because I did ask, in the end, it came down to one person with the authority to say no.  If I had more time and did not have the second obstacle, I would have pushed for a text amendment to the zoning bylaw.

My second obstacle was my wife.  She categorically refused to live in a holiday trailer even though it could be argued the accommodations would have been nicer than where we live now. She was making arrangements to stay with family.  My hope was that once the trailer was in place and she saw that it would not be that bad, she would soften and move back 'home'. But I fear, this was just a pipe dream on my part and was never going to happen despite how nice I could make the living conditions.

So with a source of accommodation dried up and with a build looming, I needed to find a place for us to live, and fast.  This is slightly complicated by the fact that my oldest cat is a resident of the neighbourhood FIRST! and our pet second.  You see, he has grown up in the neighbourhood and used to live about 300ft NW from where I live.  He is also an outside cat and just graces us with his presence at his direction. The requirement was to find an affordable place within his current 'stomping grounds' or fear an abandonment if we went someplace new (he did after-all abandon his first owners).  I also wanted to be close so I could go 'home' at lunch and keep tabs on the job site.  Fortunately, after I received the final correspondence from the District on Thursday, I went on line that night and checked the local Craigslist ads and lo and behold, the basement suite across the street was available as of Sept 1 (I had not even realized that the previous renter had left a month ago).  Today, the neighbour and I shook on a deal that would see us move in March 1 2014 and move out September 1 2015.  The two bedroom will set us back over $25K for the 19 months including a signing bonus so that he will hold it from now till we need it next March.

This will be a big hit to the budget (represents 8%) and I will need to cut costs or expend our budget accordingly,  but in the end will make my wife much happier and you know what they say.

Happy Wife - Happy Life!

Do energy targets of Passivhaus make sense and will they pay back during the lifespan of the dwelling?

I have been discussing the payback periods of Über high levels of insulation and high R value windows on LinkedIn and thought I would share my thoughts with you and possibly promote a discussion.  My comments on LinkedIn started after one participant wrote “PS: BTW, why are we talking about this in the PH forum? Aren't we all allergic to any heating other than auxiliary heaters?”.  This was a topic asking for advice on whether it made more sense to install an Air Source Heat Pump or a High Efficiency Furnace on a home that currently had an oil furnace at the end of its service life.  The dwelling of concern was not a Passivhaus, but the poster felt that the expertise of the Canadian Passive House Institute forum may be beneficial to his decision.

I commented that I felt the jury was still out on the need for a heating system in a Passivhaus design for our climate, and that in most examples I have reviewed the only way it has ‘worked’ to not have a ‘real’ heating system (many designs incorporate a hydronic or electrical resistive heating coil in the dwellings ventilation air ducts to provide ‘auxiliary’ heat), is when the occupants were willing to accept significantly lower temperatures (<+ 65°F) during cold days and nights, which is just not going to be acceptable for most occupants in North America.  But the PH Program uses the claim that a normal heating plant is not needed as a way to justify spending the extra money on extreme amounts of insulation, which in many regions will never have a reasonable chance of payback throughout the life span of the dwelling.

If you accept that some form of heating plant will be required, but through increased insulation and better windows, that plant can be substantially downside, logic would say that the smaller plant will save you money and allow for the extra expense on the insulation and windows needed to reduce your heat load and downsize your equipment.  See the circle hear.  Well logic unfortunately has nothing to do with the pricing of consumer goods.  Pricing has nothing to do with the actual cost to make an item and everything to do with how badly does the consumer want it and what are they willing to pay.  Because the average North American consumer lives in a McMansion and has a bajillion gigawatt heating plant, there is very little demand for small 10-15K BTU units that are needed in a very energy efficient home.  The result is that they cost a lot MORE than the much larger units installed in the ‘average’ homes.  So not only are you spending a lot more money on windows and insulation, you now have to triple your HVAC budget even though you are getting less.

Another poster then suggested reducing the heating load by first “renovating to Passive House-Retrofit standard with R60 Wall, R90 Roof and R50 under-slab insulation, replacing your windows with R19 Ecoglass and PH doors”.

How long of a payback is and will be acceptable to most homeowners/buyers? Does R50/60/90 (slab/wall/roof) EVER make sense in the vast majority of climates around the globe? Are windows really able to reach a R20 thermal efficiency for the total assembly?

This then lead to a new discussion topic about windows, the claims by window manufacturers (in this case EcoGlass claiming a R20 window), and the general payback metrics of the Passivhaus program and what makes sense. 

In my travels I have generally been exposed to three trains of thought when discussing the Passivhaus program; those that have drank the full pitcher of Cool-Aid and take everything at face value and run with it, those that completely dismiss the program’s claims (these tend to be people who do not believe in Global Warming or the need to reduce energy use or our carbon footprint) and often call the practitioners of the program charlatans, and finally those that can see the value in a program like Passivhaus and see the building science wisdom in many of the program’s concepts but also feel the program may go too far down the energy reduction path.

I fall squarely into the last category.   I believe we are having a detrimental effect on the environment and need to make changes in how we build and live.  Yes I plan to build a ‘close to PH’ dwelling.  I believe that PH has the right focus when designing a dwelling, unlike LEED/Built Green/or other ‘green flavours’ of the year, that are more focused on the small to minor contributions that reduce the carbon footprint, and not ensuring the elephants in the room like heat load and thermal bridging are first looked after.  How many times have we seen a LEED Platinum building with 60-80% glazing and wondered how could that building possible be energy efficient and good for the environment? 

Building a dwelling that has reduced thermal load achieved by increased insulation, reduced thermal bridging, increased air tightness, reduced window glazing with the glazing present having higher insulating value or better solar gain harvesting, utilizing south solar gain when available, and of course correct ventilation (all the fundamental building stones of the Passivhaus system) just makes sense from a building science and energy reduction point of view. 

And concentrating on your insulation and air tightness as the first and highest priorities also makes common sense, because you will most likely never get another chance to address these components during the life of that dwelling due to their inaccessibility.   So it makes sense to concentrate more of the available funds to maximizing the efficiency of these soon to be inaccessible components and calculating the optimal insulation levels based on a full life of the building cycle (20, 30, 50, 100 years?).  Components like windows and heating plants are far less important to optimize during the initial construction, when working with a limited budget (a reality for all except a select few), because both will need to be, and most importantly can easily be, replaced or upgraded in 15-20 years at the end of their service life.

But I agree with many, that the PH program goes far too far up the pendulum in its goal to reduce the energy load on a dwelling, to a point of drastically diminishing returns that are not acceptable or practical for most in North America and in my view, may actually be increasing the building’s footprint on this planet (incorporating embodied energy in a dwelling that will never be offset with energy savings).

I also feel that so often the costs to build to PH standards are grossly misstated.  I often see figures of +10% to +20% as the premium to build to the standard.  In reality it is usually at LEAST 2 – 2.5 times the cost of a house built to building code minimums.  I have seen several examples of houses built in cities in my region for under $100/sqft over the last year or two (for a 3500 – 4000 sq ft dwelling).  These are house designs that do not utilize an architect or building envelope engineer on the team, and often have only minimal structural engineering input because they are generally optimized to meet the BC Building Code’s Part 9 prescriptive rules.  They still have fancy kitchens with gas stoves and granite countertops, a gas furnace or boiler, crown mouldings, and fancy paint schemes. They however usually incorporate PVC or vinyl windows of dubious quality (R2 max and air leaky like a sieve), code min insulation levels, and no air tightness to speak of.  The types of houses build by a majority of developers/builders in the majority of cities in my region (The only City’s that buck that trend in my area are the west side of Vancouver and North and West Vancouver).   A PH on the other hand requires the use of all the specialists (for one, because no Municipal inspector is going to take responsibility for the design and you have to have an engineer sign off on every aspect of the design).  Now you are looking at $200+ per sq ft to build minimum and that is if all the rest is par with a code min dwelling.  But clients who entertain a PH typically also still want all the bells and whistles including custom cabinets, media rooms, and home automation, and so on with the costs quickly escalating to $350/built sq ft or higher.  I am often directed to the stats for countries like Germany where a PH represents at least 25% or more of all new house builds.  There is a very good reason; a builder gets a huge government grant to build to the standard, the size of the grant reportedly offsets that bulk of the added expense to build to the program.

My final concern about the program is that it is not even possible in so many locations.  In order to meet the energy targets and not have a requirement for insane levels of insulation, a Passivhaus relies on solar heat gain (SHGC) to provide a large portion of your heat during the sunny winter days and shoulder month seasons.  This is obviously only possible if you have an unobstructed view of the sun (and of course have Sun) on your south elevation.  In an urban environment, this probably represents less than 10% of the available build opportunities which make the program quite elitist and limited in its ability to apply on mass.
 
I value the work that the Passivhaus community has done around the world and applaud there tenacity for building quality homes. I however personally would much rather see the energy use requirements lowered 20-30% and applied on mass to all new construction by means of building code requirements.  Only then will we truly make a difference in the carbon emissions and fossil fuel outputs of our society and substantially reduce our dependence on fossil fuels in North America.  Fortunately, I live in a Province that is leading Canada if not North America down this path with its new requirements for ever increasing insulation, ensuring for the first time that doors and skylights have to meet the same minimum air tightness requirements as windows, and hopefully really soon, will require an air tightness demonstration that meets a minimum level at the end of construction.

As always, thanks for reading and I look forward to your comments.

Determining the Lifespan of a Dwelling

In order to determine the payback of the various design decisions needed in a new build (or even a renovation), you need to first determine the most likely lifespan of the dwelling you are designing.  Many Europeans would say a home should be around for hundreds of years because many of theirs have been. 

How is this possible? 

Most are built with brick or stone and are in OLD cities.  How old?  Well the Romans were around when many of them were in their infancy. 

Why is the age (maturity) of a city important? 

To answer that we need to look, in contrast, to cities like Vancouver and its surrounding neighbours which are all very young in comparison and changing rapidly.  Single family dwellings on small parcels of land still represent the majority of the housing built and available (when looking at land use and not just total numbers of dwelling units).  As such there is a huge potential for redevelopment as the city matures and grows. 

I live in a large single family neighbourhood 10 minutes from downtown Vancouver.  North Vancouver has predominately been a single family neighbourhood since the early 1900’s.  But it is rapidly changing (many would say for the worse due to the traffic congestion that has developed and really does not have an easy cure due to the geographical challenges of the region).  The District and the City of North Vancouver are both looking to and have been dramatically increasing density in our region with the misguided goal that doing so will make accommodation in our cities affordable.  This has been attempted over and over again in Vancouver, and the facts are that these high density ‘villages’ become sought-after-hot-spots that have some of the highest rental and real estate values in the country if not all North America.  Cole Harbour comes to mind.

I digress, why is the age or maturity of a city important? 

Well, the fast growth of urban areas in my region dramatically shortens the life span of what I feel will be the soon defunct urban single family dwelling.  While my current house was built in 1954 and has had a good run until now, I highly doubt that the house I plan to build next year on this property will come even close to 60 years before it is torn down to make way for a low to mid-rise multi-family housing.  In fact, I would be surprised if it was still around in 25 years.  With its proximity to the Down Town core, Lions Gate Bridge, and Upper Levels highway, it is prime land for re-development; development that is already underway at several nearby locations.  A single family neighbourhood less than 5 minutes from me is slated to become the new Lower Capilano Village.  Another single family neighbourhood within 7 minutes drive has now been bulldozed and is slated to become part of the Lower Lynn Town Centre.

The point I am making, is that it is unreasonable to expect that a single family dwelling built today will still be around in 50, 30, or even 20 years in many neighbourhoods in growing urban centres.  Like the cities that have a much longer lineage than those in North America, there will be a forced march to densification and an abandonment of the single family home on a small distinct plot of land.  Does it therefore make sense to model a home that would have a 50, or worse, 100 year payback in energy savings or carbon reduction in these types of neighbourhoods?  Before coming anywhere close to cancelling out the costs to build or embodied energy of the dwelling, it would be torn down and end up in a land fill. 

So often logic is not part of our design decision making process.  We want something so badly that we will fabricate a way to make that decision sensible.  Designing a home that is SO energy efficiency that it would take 50 or more years to pay back may not actually be helping the planet if that dwelling is only around 20 years.  I hope that more discussions like these will encourage a greater uptake on what makes sense in the larger picture, and start allowing informed well thought out designs that are defensible.

For my part, I believe it will be sensible to apply a 25 year life span when calculating the break even point on the various design decisions I have ahead of me.  If the dwelling is torn down earlier, I will not have left too much on the table, and if it has a longer run, the payback will have already occurred and it will then be providing dividends in carbon reduction and utility bill savings.


As always, thanks for reading and please let me know your thoughts.

1250 Kms on a single 50 litre tank of Diesel! - Reducing Carbon Impact

One of the largest carbon outputs we create as individuals, is due to our need for transportation. The graphic below from eoearth.org identifies that personal transportation is the largest contributor to personal carbon output next to recreation and leisure and represents 10% of our overall total carbon output.

My wife and I do not do a lot of air travel and we also do not drive long distances. Her work is only 10 km away and the majority of my work is also close by. My vehicle is 22 years old and my wife’s is 9 year old, so we probably buck the trend there as well (would lower the carbon in car manufacturing percentage). We also are home bodies, so I would estimate that our recreation and leisure is a lower percentage. In fact, I would imagine that our total output is much lower than the North American average due to the lifestyle we live and the efforts already in place in our household to reduce our impact.

Breakdown of a typical individual's carbon footprint. (Source: Carbon Footprint)
http://www.eoearth.org/article/Carbon_footprint

My vehicle, a 1991 Toyota Hilux Diesel Right-Hand Drive, used to produce 22.2 pounds of carbon per gallon of diesel burned (Ref 1). As I typically travel approximately 7000 miles per year and was only getting 15 MPG(USG), I was contributing a whopping 5.2 tons (10,400 lbs) of carbon to the atmosphere every year.

Well, I am pleased to advise that I have made a major shift in my output and am driving a vehicle I could almost consider carbon free.

You see, I have converted the Hilux to a duel fuel system that allows me to burn vegetable oil. But not just any vegetable oil, I am able to burn USED vegetable oil (Waste Vegetable Oil – WVO). I converted the vehicle last summer, but for technical reasons and oil supply, I have just finished my first session where I was able to fully utilize the WVO system. In typical urban driving (limited highway and no long trips), I was able to travel 1250 km before having to refill the diesel tank.

Some may ask why I don’t just burn the WVO. Well the reason is because the WVO must be heated to achieve the right viscosity before it can be burned in the engine. I have elected to heat the oil using the engine coolant system as I have a weak alternator that would not have stood up to electric resistance heating of the oil flow. Using the coolant at the heat source requires me to start the vehicle on diesel and drive until the coolant temperature is high enough (I wait till the thermostat opens and I see the temp on the dash go to normal operating temps) before switching to the WVO tank. (I have the stock diesel tank and an auxiliary WVO tank) and start burning only WVO. I can leave it on the WVO setting throughout the day as long as the vehicle will not sit for more than 2 hours. If I will be stationary for more than 2 hours or am back home for the day, I then need to switch back to Diesel to purge the WVO out of the engines injector system so that when it is cold the next day, I will not have thick congealed WVO in the engine. I usually start this purge about 2-3 km from home.

Engine compartment contains the heated WVO filter, a 30 plate heat exchanger, and two solenoid valves.

The system has worked well over the last 3 months and is well proven in the industry. In Europe, countries like Germany have formalized the ‘fuel’ and tax it like any other. All of the research I did, showed that the buring of WVO is safe as long as the fuel is properly processed to remove water and particulates and is adequately heated before burning.

For the interim, I am buying my WVO from a local ‘producer’ who collects the oil from local restaurants on the Sunshine Coast and then processes it. This involves letting the oil settle (removes most of the particulate), running the oil through a centrifuge (removes any moisture), and then running the oil through a series of filters down to 10 microns. Once the new house is completed, I will start producing the oil myself. At 50¢ per litre, I am saving 80-90¢ per litre or around $1500 per year. The system only cost $1000 in parts, so I am ahead of the game within about 8 months of typical driving.

So, what does this all mean to my personal output?

Based on 777 miles (1250 km) per 14 gals of diesel burned, my carbon output for just the diesel per year would be reduced down to 2800 lbs or a 73% reduction from my preconversion contributions.

But wait, we are not finished. Vegetable oil as a plant material is often considered carbon neutral as it is just releasing the carbon it already sequestered from the atmosphere. I question this statement, as the growing and harvesting of the seed crop that creates the oil is still a very carbon heavy activity. I would agree that vegetable oil as a food item has the lowest carbon output by a very significant margin when used as a fuel in comparison with all other fuel forms including electricity from the North American Grid. So if I was burning new, unused, vegetable oil, I would need to calculate some contribution to my carbon output.

But I am using used oil, so I am reusing a very low carbon product for the second time. I am reusing something that would otherwise be thrown away. This means that I am receiving a carbon credit in some fashion. I have been unable to find a logical resource that identifies how to calculate this credit. You would need to reduce the credit by the energy it takes to collect and process the waste oil into WVO, but what should the initial credit be? 100% of the carbon output of burning diesel, as this is the fuel being offset? 100% of the carbon created by growing, harvesting, and processing the vegetable oil?

What ever credit is used, you can see that it would quickly take my 73% reduction and increase it quickly to a point approaching 100% or Carbon Neutral.

Even at a 73% reduction however, assuming the WVO comes out neutral (no credit or contribution), this is still a feat I am very proud of. This has been an action that has significantly lowered my personal contribution to this planet and will probably represent the single largest action and carbon reduction I will ever make.

Filling Up Auxiliary WVO Tank in Cargo bay of vehicle

WVO Storage Tank – Can hold up to 1000 liters of Waste Vegetable Oil

 

 

Time for a fill-up - My supplier is delivering another 400 liters

Note: I can provide specifics of conversion for any interested parties. Just leave a comment below with your email address.

References: (1) http://www.epa.gov/oms/climate/documents/420f11041.pdf & http://www.bicyclinginfo.org/faqs/answer.cfm?id=3460

Silence

Hi All,

I just wanted to provide a short update, as I have been a bit delinquent in my postings.  It is crunch time as I come down to and pass deadlines.  I had hoped to apply for permits by the end of January but that has come and gone.  My current plans are for submission by mid March.

Tasks still outstanding:

• Get site survey (in progress)
• Get structural engineering to design beams for point loads (hope to send initial drawings by Monday)
• Design roof trusses and find vendor
• Get structural engineer to sign off on ICF vendor drawings (if I can get rail freight quote in check, otherwise will probably go with formed foundation)
• Get structural engineer to design elevated concrete floor slab
• Design plumbing system (supply and waste)
• Design electrical system
• Design fire sprinkler system (will compare cost of installation against operable windows in all bedrooms)
• Design Upper Master Bedroom Deck
• Design Low Voltage and Home Automation system (I wanted a fully 'automated' home with relays controlling all lighting circuits, but time is ticking)
• Design rain water recovery system
• Design Grey Water Heat Recover System
• Design Heating and AC system (no small feat as I want to look at solar capture, air source heat pump, and solid fuel boiler)
• Design Mechanical Ventilation System
• Finish 3D design (90% complete)
• Create general materials BOM and get quotes (15% complete).
• Create schedule (90% complete).
• Create layouts required by permit app (40% complete)
• Secure a construction mortgage
• Bring in 40ft Shipping Container for construction storage
• Buy a 5^th wheel trailer to live in (as long as I can secure permission from District as needs to be in front yard as I have no lane access to back yard)
• Pack and Move
• Volunteer at a build site for a day with Alfie in return for building and landscape material I will salvage out of a house before it is torn down.
• Create a website for the build that will have three live web-cam feeds and hourly time lapse photos along with a wealth of information on sponsored products.
• Setup project team for the building ‘science lab’ and secure final funding.
• Oh Ya – Build a house!

My schedule shows that as long as I start the excavation by late May, that I will be able to get the roof on and the building generally waterproof by the October rains. The problem is how much work has to be done prior to this milestone. 

To divert as much material as possible away from the land fill, I will not just bring a tractor in to demolish the house and put in a few large trucks off to the dump.  This is the easy way (takes a day) and the standard way construction is handled in pretty much all of North America.  My plan is to deconstruct the existing dwelling and re-use, sell, free-cycle, and re-cycle as much of the material as possible.  Why is this not done more often?  Labour Costs!  I predict that this task will take 24 man days to complete.  While this only represents $5000 or so of labourer time, there most likely is not $5000 of savings from the reduced dump fees and sale of usable products and scrap metal. 

But I believe that this extra 'effort' will go further in reducing my carbon output from the project than all of the typical 'green-building' program's selections of flooring, cabinets, counters, and paints combined. I will of course still make 'greener' decisions on some internal components, but in general I will be concentrating on the large fruit starting with ensuring a rock solid and efficient building enclosure.

So, this month of deconstruction, packing and moving, and all permit documentation has to be completed before the end of May which is putting me under the vice big time.  I set April 8, 2013 as a theoretical start date back when I first started this blog.  This date was plucked out of the air because it was exactly 500 days from the first blog entry (which had a nice ring to it and seemed like a lot of time).  As I have been completing my schedule, I have been working backwards from Sept 30 (the point I want to have the dwelling generally water tight). 

Last night I finished most of the schedule including most of the prebuild tasks.  I was astonished to see that the beginning of the schedule (start of deconstruction) lands on April 8! 

Is this an omen that everything is falling into place?  I sure hope so!

With schedule close to complete - start date is April 8!

Peak Oil 'Solved' - But Climate WIll Fry

It is scary when even the oil producers admits we are in trouble and that burning all of that oil may not be in our best interests.

http://www.vancouverobserver.com/blogs/climatesnapshot/peak-oil-solved-climate-will-fry-bp-report

When will we as a society wake up and start forcing our politicians to make a difference?  When will we  start making a difference in our own lives?

Does Global Warming Exist? ah .... Yes!

I was recently involved in a Linked-in conversation that turned to a discussion of "Does Global Warming exist".

I was flummoxed that there were still those today, who totally deny the evidence right in front of them and, who state this is all just self serving propaganda and lies.  I was even called a "socialist fascists" which I have to admit, threw me as I certainly do not see myself in that way. 'Global weather changes', which is what I like to call it, is a pretty well accepted fact in my region and in fact across Canada.  Many of the building science seminars and courses I have attended over the last 5 years have had at least some conversation focusing on the changing planet and the unsustainability of our current practices.  There is also a general realization, in the circles I travel, that peak oil is behind us and energy is going to get a lot more expensive in the future.

I can only surmise that those who don't 'believe', have not been exposed to the facts and are ignorant of the issues and existing measured trends.

At the recent BC Building Envelope Council AGM, Keynote Speaker - Dr. Andrew J. Weaver presented the attached presentation.

• 10 of the warmest years on record have been since 1998 (pg 18)

• The energy provided by the Sun to the upper atmosphere has been pretty stable since 1978, but the surface temperature of the earth is rising rapidly (pg 20)

• The arctic sea ice has been declining rapidly, but more importantly the thickness of the remaining ice is dropping which with further increase the decline the covered ocean.  (Pg 22 to 25)

• The extremes of the Earth's Surface Temperature are increasing rapidly (Pg 33/34)

It is really hard to dispute these facts unless your POV is that everyone is going around lying (which is a sad world to live in). Sure there are some scientists who are influenced by the funding providers (on both sides of the debate), but all of them?

I have seen so many consistent concerns by the scientific community, that I choose to believe there is some substance to it, and that we need to take action now!

But there was one slide in particular that highlights the battle we have to move towards a solution on a global scale.  Slide 2 showed that during a series of public opinion poles, 80% of Canadians believed there was strong evidence that Global Warming exists, where only 58% of the USA public believed there was enough evidence to come to the same conclusions. 

As long as one of the largest resource users in the world turns a blind eye to the problems presented by climate change, are any of us going to be successful in addressing it?

Extracted from Dr. Andrew Weavers presentation to BCBEC on September 26/2012

Barriers to 'Green' - Ignorance?

Marc Stoiber recently sat down with Jim Nelson - Senior Marketing Manager at BC Hydro, and extracted Jim's list of seven psychological barriers to the general public accepting and embracing 'green' (Full interview).

But I believe there may be another even bigger barrier, that Jim has missed, and that is ignorance.  I do not mean this in a negative way, but a true definition of the word way.  You see, I consider myself fairly well informed on many energy efficiency issues and I definitely want to do the 'right' thing, even if it costs me a little extra in the short term.

But what is the 'right' thing?

I presently do not have enough knowledge to make that decision and I believe that many people would be in a similar or even worse situation. I have spent a LOT of time researching my upcoming build.  I have literally spent hundreds if not thousands of hours over several years researching the best practices of building envelopes, HVAC, electrical efficiency, etc.  But in many ways, I am no closer now to being able to make the 'right' decisions than when I started.  There is so much information available these days thanks to the internet and search engines like Google.  Answers are literally a few clicks away, but unfortunately much of these answers are conflicting depending on the bias or knowledge of the presenter.  You are often unable to determine the best course of action.


This has often left me felling frustrated and can paralyze you from moving forward.  An example is needed:

Over the last few days there has been a discussion on Linked-In asking about the sanity of using electric resistance baseboard heaters (Full Discussion - Building Science Group: Have we lost our minds when we use resistance heating in low load buildings?)  I have been actively participating in this conversation because I though I could provide knowledgeable responses. But in the end, my assumptions were challenged leaving me wondering where I stood and feeling quite ignorant on the subject.

The basic premise I first had was based on the fact that I live in a region blessed with abundant clean energy, that being Hydro Electric.  Currently, 90% of our Province's power comes from Hydro Electric generation with the balance being made up with Natural Gas fired Thermal (7.5%) and the rest is purchased energy (much of it from Alberta's coal generation with a smattering of renewable like wind).  My logic was that I should utilize this 'green' energy in my upcoming build in order to reduce my carbon contribution to the planet.  I would look at an air source heat pump ASHP (utilizes electricity to harvest free 'heat' from the air outside your home much in the same way as your refrigerator works to evacuate heat from its interior - just in reverse).  I would use the heated refrigerant created by the ASHP to heat water (through the use of a heat exchanger) that would then be circulated through radiant panels I would place in my walls and ceilings (I will discuss why I will not do radiant floors in a future blog).  In the summer time, I would reverse the heat pump and created chilled water that I could then use to help cool the home.

Many models of ASHP are available, but efficiencies as high as 4+ are available (meaning for every unit of electricity used, there will be 4 units of heat available).  This sounds pretty good, doesn't it.  But we are not done yet, we also have to take into account the source losses for the energy used and reduce our efficiency accordingly.

In a conversation I had with Dr. John Straube of Building Science Canada last winter, he suggested that an appropriate way to look at electricity generation may be to look at all of the generation sources feeding your particular electrical interconnection.  I am part of the Western Electric Coordinating Council (WECC) interconnect  which does have a lot of hydro electric generation, but is also supplemented by dirtier generation sources like coal. He suggested a source energy factor of 1.5 to 1.7 may be appropriate (for every kWh consumed at site, 1.5 to 1.7 kWh must be generated.  The .5 to .7 lost kWh's represents transmission losses and generation inefficiencies).  So a ASHP efficiency of 4 now drops to 2.35 - 2.67 when taking into account the source energy factor. Not as good but still at least 235% efficient.

What are the alternatives?  For me, the logical alternative would be a high-efficiency-modulating-condensing-natural gas fired boiler.  These type of units can have a site energy efficiency of 95%+ which translates into a source efficiency around 90% when adding in a 1.05% source energy factor (yes there are also 'transmission' losses - venting and pumping - in gas pipelines that account for most of the 5% loss).  This is starting to look a lot less attractive.  We have 90% efficient gas compared to 235%+ efficient electricity, and this formed the basis of my preliminary decision to not even re-connect the gas line up to my upcoming build.

Now the original Linked-in conversation was considering the use of electric resistance baseboard heaters.  These are considered to have a 100% site efficiency which would translate into a 66% down to 59% source efficiency when taking into account the source energy factor of my region.  This is poor in comparison with even the Natural Gas fired boiler efficiency.  I would never consider such a heating source UNLESS the heating load was so low, due to the envelope efficiency, that electric resistance baseboards or radiant panels were the only heat source that could ramp down low enough to not overheat the dwelling.  This can often be the case in dwellings that have extreme levels of insulation like those certified in the PassiveHaus program.  These homes, by virtue of their certification, must have heating loads not exceeding 10W per square meter of living space.  Unless the dwelling is quite large, this low of a load is often exceeded even by the smallest equipment currently available on the marketplace. Unfortunately, electric resistance baseboards are common in my region for some single family houses and abundant in multi-family housing.

On the surface, the decision looks easy - choose the 235% minimum efficient ASHP and that was were I stood a day ago.  But I was then challenged by individuals in the discussion to visualize a larger picture.  As mentioned I live in BC which has an abundance of hydro.  My interconnect also has a high ratio of Hydro arguably giving it a source energy factor around 1.5 to 1.7.  The rest of the USA in comparison is dirty, to just plain filthy, due to its heavy dependence on coal fired power plants.  The average source energy factor for the USA is around 3.3 meaning for every unit of electric energy used in the home, 3.3 units of energy have to be created and added to the grid.  This would bring our ASHP example down to a efficiency of 1.2 or 120%. Still better than gas but a lot worse than the average for my region.  An electric baseboard on average in the USA would only have a efficiency of 30% when the source factor is taken into account - clearly a poor choice!

On the surface, no regions should use electric baseboards (unless the loads are VERY low) and in all regions, an efficient ASHP would be a better choice than even the most efficient gas boiler or forced air furnace.  Again, the decision seems clear - right?? 

But what happens when a person in a region with 'green' hydro energy decides to use a gas fired heating system to reduce their electrical usage to allow more of that 'green' electricity to feed into the grid, and by doing so, hope to reduce the ratio of filthy coal power?

Does anyone benefit?  Will the extra kWh's made available offset coal production or will the power just be consumed by increased demand of a non-energy conserving nation?  How does one predict the actions of a consumer?  How does one measure the result of such a decision?  Should one use a 'green' electricity themselves, or use a dirtier energy so that they can pass on their clean power to users that only have filthy electricity available?

What is the right answer???  This is just one example of how difficult the right answer may be to obtain.  An ignorance of the needed facts to make the right decision can paralyze a person from making any decision, which in turn could often lead to the adoption of the status quo (one of the barriers mentioned by Jim Nelson).

Now of course, I do not have this as an option.  I must put some form of heating system into my planed build.  To this end, I would appreciate input from those with relevant knowledge, that could help provide the information I need to make this decision.