Getting Tested?

[James Meehan]

Not you getting tested...getting the building tested!

As a Home Performance Expert I run into many situations of uncomfortable, unhealthy, and too often unsafe indoor home environments. When it comes to getting the most out of a house in terms of controlling the systems that affect all of those previous situations; I find that there are very few people educated on what it takes to have control. Most contractors are completely ignorant to side effects from performing their work. Plumbers and electricians causing homes to leak heated or cooled air to the outside, general contractors installing insulation improperly leading to mold, or even HVAC contractors installing new water heaters or heating systems that are not tuned, untested, and dangerous.

I can't even remember how often I've seen unprofessional work so we won't even go into do it yourself work on important systems. As a landlord, flipper or a homeowner it's ultimately your responsibility to make sure that the internal environment of your buildings are at the very least safe. Are you going to blame someone else when the water heater back-drafts exhaust into your building and gives the occupants Carbon Monoxide poisoning? Or are you going to take control of these systems by getting them tested? You can't expect the contractor installing or servicing any major system in your buildings to be performing safety and performance tests unless they are clearly specified in the work-scope and the contractor is properly certified to do the tests.

Consider this scenario:

The gas furnace stops working and the HVAC contractor sells you on getting a new safer high efficiency unit. The new unit no longer vents into the chimney, it has a PVC pipe that vents out of the side of the house. Great you think, I'm getting a nice new unit that no longer relies on a chimney to get the exhaust gases out of the home, plus it will cost less to operate. These things are well and good but did the contractor realize that after installing this new unit that the chimney is now oversized for the now “orphaned” hot water heater that is still venting into the old chimney? Did they offer to do combustion appliance zone (CAZ) testing under worst case conditions to verify that everything is performing properly? Did they require that a chimney liner be installed within the old chimney to avoid future problems with the exhaust from the water heater? Did they use a combustion analyzer to tune the new furnace and set the proper gas pressure? Did they verify that the carbon monoxide created by the furnace or water heater is within specification? Even if they did offer all these things, how do you know that you got what you paid for? The best practice here is to have a home energy audit preformed. In finding a home performance contractor that can assess the safe and efficient operation of the major systems of you home one thing to look for are contractors with certifications. The one I'm most familiar with is the the Building Performance Institute (BPI), these are the ones my business operates under. For example when performing an “Home Energy Audit” there are several things that I test for, some may not apply based on climate:

1. Air “Tightness”. Is there too much or too little air exchange in the home with outdoor air. This is done with a blower door test. This can be a major point of energy costs and air quality issues. Either the house is too loose and wasting energy in hot or cold climates, or it's too tight and may have air quality concerns.
2. Combustion Systems. Think gas/oil/propane/kerosene furnaces, boilers, water heaters, ovens, fireplaces, gas dryers. Does the duct work deliver all the hot or cold air where it's intended? Is everything properly tuned, installed and venting the exhaust products out of the home. How much carbon monoxide is getting into the indoor air? Is that new gas oven from Home Depot properly tuned? You could be sitting there telling yourself, “Heck I'll just install CO detectors” but what happens when the tenant removes the battery and do you really want to trust a cheap gadget with wide operating tolerances that may or may not alert someone in time?
3. Moisture Issues Are there any problems with moisture control. Wet or moist basements and crawlspaces (think mold). Is too much air escaping through the ceiling in winter and causing condensation (think mold again) to form underneath the roof. Bathrooms without proper ventilation fans that actually get the excess moisture out of the home. Is the home too dry in the winter? Many possible health effects in this category
4. Sufficient Insulation that is properly installed and the proper material for the location. I hardly ever see a home that can't improve in this category.
5. Radon Sources Do you have a dirt floor in basement or crawlspace. Is there a proper vapor barrier or radon mitigation system installed if needed. Radon is a major cause of lung cancer.
6. Odd Structures Think the “WALDO” triplex. How's the air quality in that non-conforming basement? Is there enough air exchange below grade there? Is moisture being properly controlled or is a dehumidifier running all the time to mask moisture problems? What's the Radon level? Is there sufficient isolation between units for sound and smells? Are the combustion systems properly isolated from the living space? Are there side attics on the top floor that are notorious for being energy loss locations? Don't think new construction is exempt. Some of the worst issues I've seen is with brand new buildings. For anything with an attached garage, is there sufficient isolation between a cars exhaust and little Timmy sleeping upstairs?
7. Energy Sources Is there potential advantage to changing the configuration of heating or cooling? For example in cold climates air source heat pumps are a quickly advancing method of being able to replace gas, oil, or wood heating systems with purely electric units. They are currently are at the same efficiency ($ per BTU of heat output) as natural gas. In the next couple years many HVAC contractors may need to rethink their business models as gas, oil and wood heat becomes antiquated. Solar is ultimately the best source for becoming energy independent for most homes. With the current incentives available the payback on solar-thermal systems (water heating) can be under 5 years and solar-electric (or photovoltaic) in as few as 10 years.
8. Converting Unconditioned Space into Living Space Want to make that porch or attic a bedroom? Want to section out part of that attached garage for an extra bathroom? An experienced Home Performance Expert is your best shot at making sure the new space is comfortable and healthy.

NYSERDA of New York State actually offers to pay for most residents in the state to have one of these Energy Audits performed (Retail Value about $600). Other states have different offerings but after getting one of the audits done, it can open you up to getting heavy discounts and financing through the Home Performance with Energy Star program. Check with your state for what is offered. www.dsireusa.org is a great starting point for finding out what incentives are available. In New york for example if you had medium to low income tenants, you could could potentially get completely free work done to the home that results in safer and more efficient indoor environments. Not only are you getting value added to the building but your being a more responsible landlord...and it might cost you nothing except the time to make the appointments. You could honestly save someones life (http://www.extension.iastate.edu/pages/communications/co/co_cases.html) by getting these systems properly tested and verified. It may cost you a bit to have one depending on what state you live in but it more than pays for itself in the peace of mind it can bring.