Last Updated on July 4, 2021 by Showrooms Online
Air Sealing Your New Home for Efficiency
Air sealing your new home for efficiency is the most important thing you can do to save energy. If you are building a custom home, this is easily coordinated with your builder. The same air sealing advice applies to an existing home. However, air sealing an existing home will be more unique to each project.
“Air leakage control is the single most important retrofit activity, and it should be considered first in any upgrade strategy for your house.”
This Natural Resources Canada article is a good introduction to the why and how of air sealing. Our recommendation is to use a professional service and the article supports this.
A professional will use a BLOWER DOOR TEST to establish the before and after air leakage rates.
To fully understand the challenges of air sealing a home you need to watch the following 2 videos. Normally, our blogs link to external information for those readers who want to take a deeper dive. However, the following real-life air sealing example highlights a project that you will appreciate more if you have watched the videos first.
Matt Risinger Calls AEROBARRIER A Game Changer
AEROBARRIER at the Matt Risinger House
If you just want to build your house to Net Zero or near Net Zero standards and really only care about getting the air sealing done then contact AEROBARRIER (link to the head office website) in CANADA and they will put you in contact with the dealer for your area.
Air Sealing Your New Home for Efficiency
A Recent Project by
Airtight Home Technologies is the dealer for Eastern Ontario and surrounding region.
Gary Sharp
Airtight Home Technologies | AEROBARRIER Dealer
(613) 220-9987
Our Air Sealing Project Overview
The house we air sealed is a log home with two floors, 3650 sq ft, with a basement.
The basement was constructed with Insulated Concrete Forms (ICF). The wall system has an air barrier detailed by the log home manufacturer. The cathedral roof has been completely foamed.
The windows and doors are high quality from a manufacturer in Europe.
It was expected that the whole house would be quite airtight to start.
The basement was already finished and being lived in by the owner while the rest of the construction was being completed. Finished areas require horizontal surfaces to be covered and protected before sealing, as some mist will settle on them. This adds quite a bit of preparation time and extra cost.
It was believed that the ICF basement would be reasonably airtight already. Therefore, there would not be a significant penalty for not sealing it. So, the decision was made to seal only the top two floors with AeroBarrier. We isolated the top two floors by closing off the stairway to the basement.
image by Sujin Jetkasettakorn courtesy of freedigitalphotos.net
The Data
Negative pressure blower door tests were completed on the whole house and on the two floors above the basement both before and after the AeroBarrier sealing process. The data showed that the basement was, in fact airtight. We did those tests using a licensed Energy Advisor.
House Areas
Basement: 1886 ft2, Upper 2 Floors: 3646 ft
House Volume
Basement: 18,877 ft3
Upper 2 Floors: 43, 263 ft3
AeroBarrier Results (Positive Pressure Tests)
Starting: 1047.7 CFM of Leakage, 1.45 ACH
Finishing: 365.6 CFM of Leakage, 0.51 ACH
Blower Door (Negative Pressure Tests)
Before Sealing
Whole House: 1267 CFM, 1.22 ACH
Top Two Floors: 1083 CF, 1.5 ACH
After Sealing the Top Two Floors
Whole House: 750 CFM, 0.72 ACH
Top Two Floors: 472 CFM, 0.66 ACH
Conclusions
The top two floors are 70% of the whole house volume. The blower door tests showed that prior to AeroBarrier Sealing, 85% of the home’s air leakage was coming from the top two floors. This also verified that the ICF basement was already at a good level of airtightness, as expected, relative to the log walls and roof above.
In fact, the house, as-built, was already at an airtight standard of 1.22 ACH. New houses built to the Building Code in Ontario range from 2.5 to 3.0. We do not do many projects where the starting point is at this level of airtightness.
At 1.22 ACH50 prior to sealing the house was already meeting the requirements of R-2000, Energy star and Net Zero Ready.
The end result at 0.72 ACH50 is better than a great majority of houses in Canada and close to the Passive House standard of 0.60 ACH50. This level of airtightness and the insulation values of the walls, ceiling, and basement make this a Net-Zero Ready home, The reduction in air infiltration reduces the capacity and investment in solar panels to reach Net-Zero.
We service:
To the Quebec/Ontario border, to the east, Peterborough and Belleville. Cornwall, Ottawa, Brockville, Gananoque, Kingston, Napanee, Picton, Kaladar
Any Questions? We can help. Every home has some unwanted air infiltration.
