Departments
Editorial
Will Global Warming Rekindle HERS?
Letters
Field Notes
Solving a Chimney
Moisture Problem
Conservation Clips
Trends
Weather Data
Getting Cloudy
Affordable Comfort Reaches New Heights
Gas vs. Electric:An Equal Playing Field at Hand?
Appliance Efficiency--
California in the
Vanguard Again
On the cover:
Patrea Wilson, of the Energy Keep in
Whitewater, Wisconsin, arrives on the scene to do a home energy rating.
(See page 11.)
Photo courtesy of
Larry Hasterock
|
Feature Articles
We look at the prospects for ratings industries as
they take their first steps in Canada, hit turbulent adolescence in Europe,
and reach relative maturity in the United States. We also report on one
experiment examining how reliable HERS ratings are for existing homes.
Home Ratings Sweep the Nation—Almost
by Greg Thomas
HERS Experiment Cause for
Confidence
by James Cavallo
Canadian Ratings Warming
Up
by Deborah Rider AIIen
European Union Not Unified
on Home Ratings
by Véronique Richalet
and George Henderson
by Jeffrey Christian, Andre Desjarlais,
Jan Kosny, and Elisabeth Kossecka
In certain climates, houses built with high-mass
walls are more efficient to heat and cool than houses built using standard
construction techniques. But exactly how much more efficient are they?
A newly developed R-value equivalent helps to provide the answer.
by Sandy Cataldo
Thanks to retrofits with ground source heat pumps,
the U.S. government has saved 26—27% in residential energy costs at one
air force base. It expects similar savings at other projects that use this
groundbreaking technology.
by Bion D. Howard
PowerDOE, a new energy design tool based on DOE-2,
is easy to use while still being flexible and offering many helpful features.
Another new tool, Green Building Advisor, offers a unique approach to environmentally
responsible design. |
