Library

Report providing builders in marine climates with guidance for building homes that have whole-house energy savings of 40% over the Building America benchmark with no added overall costs for consumers.

Document providing guidance to U.S. home builders who want to accept the challenge.

Presentation about building highly efficient, affordable homes that will achieve 40% whole-house energy savings in mixed-humid climates.

Report summarizing the guidelines for developing and reporting analytical results in a consistent and meaningful manner for all home energy uses.

Document describing the Building America research benchmark for the residential building program.

Research study describing a number of promising foundation and basement insulation strategies that can meet the requirement for better thermal control in colder climates while enhancing moisture control, health, and comfort.

Document providing an example procedure for establishing acceptance-range criteria to assess results from software undergoing BESTEST-EX.

Document with the Quality Control Checklist developed as both a guide to assist in the transition to high performance home building, and as a simplified tool to be used as part of any builder's on-site quality control procedures.

Report describing ventilation system design, including a central fan integrated supply (CFIS) system, made up of a 6-inch outdoor air intake duct connected to the return side of the air handler with a fan cycling control to make sure the fan runs a programmed minimum amount of time.

Report evaluating the accuracy of the regression technique used in 2006 by using the same least-squares regression analysis on data created from hourly energy simulation software.

Report about an experimental evaluation conducted on a night sky cooling system designed to substantially reduce space cooling needs in homes in North American climates.

Document providing an example procedure for establishing acceptance-range criteria to assess results from software undergoing BESTEST-EX.

Report presenting the process of a residential retrofit project for houses in the states of Florida and Alabama, including findings at the time of reporting and highlights of the first home to meet the target HERS Index of 70.

Fact sheet describing the function of housewrap, its attributes, and common problems associated with its use, including housewrap vs. building paper and housewrap installation; also published in FEMA P-499 “Home Builder’s Guide to Coastal Construction: Technical Fact Sheet Series.”

Report about measurements of three recent vintage dishwashers of very different efficiencies showing that while they are substantially more efficient than older dishwashers.

Report about promoting energy efficiency for Hilton Head Island.

Document presenting a cost effective method that was used by four builders in the Gainesville, FL area to construct interior ducts in over a dozen site built homes.

Fact sheet describing how typical wall moisture barrier systems work, the moisture barrier system and common problems associated with them; also published in FEMA P-499 “Home Builder’s Guide to Coastal Construction: Technical Fact Sheet Series.”

Document describing a hygrothermal modeling study, including all of the US climate zones, a range of interior humidity levels and numerous arrangements and types of insulation.

Information sheet about mold mitigation.

Report discussing development of scopes of work and quality management for builders in mixed-humid climates.

Report about an experimental evaluation has been conducted on a night sky cooling system designed to substantially reduce space cooling needs in homes in North American climates.

Report highlighting the evaluation methods used and extent of wind washing found in a study analyzing wind washing in thirty-two two-story homes.

Report presenting the results of a study evaluating retrofit solutions for addressing the effects of wind washing on homes.

Report briefly reviewing past research on the effects of occupant behavior on residential energy use and then covering a two year pilot evaluation of a low cost residential energy feedback system installed in twenty case study homes in Florida.

Report briefly reviewing past research on the effects of occupant behavior on residential energy use and then covering a two year pilot evaluation of a low cost residential energy feedback system installed in twenty case study homes in Florida.

Document with information about the most practical methods to achieve whole-wall performance of R-30 or above.

Document outlining the approach to quality assurance in the construction process as recommended by Building Science Corporation for new residential construction.

Information sheet describing refrigerant line installation and system startup procedures.

Document presenting results from testing prototype HVAC duct system designs that would locate the entire length of duct work within the air and thermal barriers of the building envelope. These include one that incorporated a high-side supply register, one that utilized a single soffit located within...

Presentation providing information about correctly installing ductwork in new and existing homes.

Report identifying the steps to take, with the help of a qualified home performance contractor, to seal unwanted air leaks while ensuring healthy levels of ventilation and avoiding sources of indoor air pollution.

Report about a tool developed to enable users to compare a typical 1970s ranch home against an IECC 2009 code-compliant home of the same configuration and against the 70s base case plus retrofits.

Information sheet about insulation retrofits for the hot-dry climate zones.

Information sheet about exterior insulation in the hot-dry climate zones.

Information sheet about HVAC equipment design to maximize energy efficiency in the hot-dry climate zone.

Information sheet describing solar PV upgrade for an existing homes.

Information sheet describing tankless hot water heating systems in existing homes.

Information sheet describing solar hot water systems in existing homes.

Information about a roof retrofit using a metal, cool roof system.

Information sheet describing tankless hot water heating systems in existing homes.

Information sheet about envelope and roof moisture control retrofit for a home.

Information sheet about window retrofit strategies for hot-dry climates.

Report comparing the performance of seven differing types of residential water heating systems in a side-by-side test configuration over a full year period.

Case study of new home construction in the hot-dry and mixed-dry climate zones.

Report discussing Building America whole house systems research within the broad effort to reduce or eliminate the environmental impact of building and provides specific recommendations for future Building America research based on Building Science Corporations experience with several recent...

Document providing a case study of commissioned performance measures that justify costs for these demonstration and "live" show homes.

Document describing the measured annual performance data from 12 recent-vintage very low energy homes in the US.

Report describing concentrations of 54 volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and ventilation rates that were measured in four new manufactured houses over 2 - 9.5 months following installation and in seven new site built houses 1 - 2 months after completion.

Factsheet describing the importance of system charging, superheat and subcooling.