It is Spring Tune-Up Time for Your Home

Posted April 25, 2012 By Lucas Hamilton and has no comments yet.

Lucas Hamilton

Lucas Hamilton is Manager, Building Science Applications for CertainTeed Corporation

It is spring and we just celebrated the 42nd Anniversary of Earth Day. While you are contemplating changes you can make to your home and property to conserve energy or improve curb appeal in a re-heating real estate market, keep in mind that this is the perfect time to do a home inspection and make sure that your home is efficient, safe and in-keeping with the Earth Day ideals.

Here are a few places you should inspect:

  • Inspect your roof for missing or broken shingles or possible places where water could come in. If your roof is not ventilated properly you could have damage from ice dams. Nothing could be greener than making our existing resources last longer and your roof is the first line of defense.
  • Check your attic or crawl space to make sure that water is not coming in.  It is also a good time to see if you need to add additional insulation to your attic space. The attic is one of the easiest places in a home to add insulation and insulation prices are about as low as they get right now so no point in waiting.
  • Clean your gutters.  Make sure they are cleared for the rainy season. Leaves and dirt can build up in any season. Clogged gutters are one of the most efficient ways to redirect water back into your building once you have already shed it.
  • Tune up your air conditioner.  It is the prime time for specials from contractors. Making sure that your unit is working properly can help save on utility bills and actually improve your indoor air quality.
  • Check your walls and foundation for any cracks that could cause moisture infiltration. You must maintain your barriers.
  • Check the basement for mold. When the temperature gets above 41 degrees that is when mold is happy. If mold is present you will be able to smell it. If it smells bad it is bad.

If you have an older home it is critical to make upgrades and improvements when signs of weakness appear.  Taking care of simple repairs will save you money over time but will also make your home more competitive in the marketplace and make for a healthier habitat for you and your family.

About Lucas Hamilton

Lucas Hamilton is Manager, Building Science Applications for CertainTeed

Building Hope for the Future with Habitat for Humanity

Posted March 2, 2012 By Vicky Gallagher and has no comments yet.
We all know that homeownership is considered the cornerstone of the American dream.  But many of us take that dream for granted.  I was reminded of this when I attended the dedication and blessing of a home with Habitat for Humanity in Chester, Pennsylvania outside of Philadelphia.

As a corporate sponsor of what we have come to refer to as the “CertainTeed House” because of the many CertainTeed products incorporated into the building envelop of this two-family house, I participated in the dedication and blessing of the house.  The family, a single mother with two daughters who will occupy half of the house, seemed simultaneously overwhelmed and excited.

The group of family, friends, sponsors and supporters clustered into what would soon be the family’s living room as the Reverend began the dedication and blessing.  The group traveled from room to room with the family carrying a candle as each area was given a special blessing – from the kitchen where nourishment is prepared to the dining room where bread is broken and shared to the bedrooms where sleeping safe and secure is desired.  Once the blessing was completed, the keys were presented to the family marking the final transformation of this building from simply a house into a home.

It was beautiful!

But there was an added sense of pride that I felt standing in this completed house that would be the dream home for this family. Over ten weeks during the building of this house approximately 80 of my co-workers volunteered time on the site to help with the build.  The opportunity to gain hands-on experience with CertainTeed roofing shingles, housewrap, vinyl siding and railing, insulation and gypsum products was as valuable as the satisfaction of giving back to the community in this very special way.  In some cases it brought employees together whose paths would not cross at work and in other cases departmental teams used this as a teambuilding exercise.

In the end, it was a learning experience for all and a lesson in community that has no equal.

About Vicky Gallagher

Vicky Gallagher is Communications Manager for CertainTeed Corporation

Cautionary Tale on Installing Vegetative Roofs

Posted June 4, 2010 By Lucas Hamilton and has 2 comments.

LiveRoof

While presenting a workshop last week in Northern New Jersey hosted by Grubb & Ellis, Inc., a property management firm, I engaged in a conversation with an architect about a learning experience he encountered while installing a vegetative or live Roof.  

Vegetative roofs have been utilized in Europe for about 25 years and are gaining popularity in the United States especially for commercial buildings. From a building science perspective the thing I like about live roofs is the natural property of plants when it comes to resisting solar heat gain from infrared radiation.  The albedo, which is the surface reflectivity of the sun’s radiation, plays a large part in the benefit of a live roof.

On the hottest day in the summer, the average surface temperature of living plants in direct sunlight is only two degrees greater than the temperature of the ambient air. If you measured the temperature of a dark surface it could be as much 20 to 30 degrees higher than the ambient air.  Since plants never get more than two degrees hotter than the ambient air it makes them the obvious cool roof. 

While we are seeing an increase in cool roofs in building design, we can’t lose sight of common sense.  Now back to the architect and his tale.

This architect explained that the construction on the project was delayed which meant that the vegetative roof was installed in the summer.  By the time the plants arrived to be installed on the roof structure it was July, the hottest and driest time of year in northern New Jersey.  As a result, the first three months of the roofs’ life required watering.  The architect never imagined that he would have to water his roof for three months.

The designers and contractors never considered in the scheduling that the vegetative roof would need support if installed at the hottest and driest time of year.  The installation of the living component could have been delayed to more appropriately suit the environmental conditions but the benefit to the building of the vegetative albedo would not have been realized when it was actually needed the most- in the mid and late summer. It’s a great example of one of the many trade-offs we have to evaluate when building sustainably.  

 

Lucas Hamilton

Lucas Hamilton is Manager, Building Science Applications at CertainTeed Corporation

About Lucas Hamilton

Lucas Hamilton is Manager, Building Science Applications for CertainTeed


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