Lawson Home Services recently completed a project which began back in November 2021, when David Lawson inspected this Magnolia, DE home using the latest infrared (IR) camera technology. The IR camera enabled David to quickly see where the building shell was leaking energy due to air leaks and inadequate insulation. These are the two most common problems energy auditors find in modern homes with comfort issues.
Before Delaware Energy Building Codes were legislated and enforced, contractors did things the old-school way. Unfortunately this created many home comfort issues for the homeowners while simultaneously causing unnecessarily high utility costs. That's a lose lose situation.
Solution
Have a look at the "before after pictures" They aren't actually before and after, but rather two different views of the same thing. The side of the image labeled "before" is taken through the eyes of a normal camera, as a human being would see it. The side of the image labeled "after" is taken through the infrared camera. The darker spots show colder areas and the orange spots the hotter areas. Be sure to read the comments accompanying each picture.
That's the attic access hatch. It's one of the places where energy leaks most commonly occur. The reason for this is the hatches are not air sealed, and are poorly insulated, if at all. In the summertime the attic can reach temperatures as high as 150 degrees. The heat radiates right through the attic hatch, which acts like a giant heating panel, defeating the air conditioning. In the winter the homeowner wants to retain the heat in the living spaces. Instead it leaks right through the attic hatch into the attic where it does no good at all. The solution is simple - we install an insulated, air-sealed attic hatch.
Punch-outs were common in home construction of the last century. Unfortunately not a lot of attention was given to insulating them properly. As you can see, the wall surfaces are much colder than the objects inside the room. This is probably because the rim band directly below, into which the floor joists are tied to the top of the foundation walls, is neither air sealed nor insulated. This means heat (in winter) is being sucked away towards these cold spots, making the room feel drafty and chilly. The solution: insulate and air seal the rim band joists down in the basement.
Vaulted ceilings, though they give a more spacious feeling to a room, are often the source of home comfort issues in modern homes. They are difficult to insulate properly. As you can see the colder rafters show right through the ceiling drywall, which tells us they are sucking heat out of the room. The solution here is not always an easy one.
Knee walls are created often when second story rooms are located inside the roof structure. This puts a small attic right next to the living space. Conventional practice was to install fiberglass bat insulation against the intermediary wall. But several problems occur with this construction method. Gravity eventually has its way and tugs the insulation away from the wall surfaces, allowing air form the attic to sneak right in behind the insulation and heat or cool the wall surfaces. This leave the rooms inside trying to match the temperature inside the attic, which can reach 150 degrees in summer and 30 degrees or colder in winter. The result is an uncomfortable room.
The upstairs of this style of home is often difficult to heat and cool because of the built-in construction flaws. Lawson Home Services offers affordable solutions to improve this home comfort issue. You can see on the highest and lowest temperatures on the scale at the left side of the camera, quite a spread, really.
Included in Lawson Home Services energy audit is a screening for deadly radon gas concentration inside the home. This silent killer, responsible for 15% of all cases of lung cancer in the USA, lurks inside every home. Everyone needs to know if their home is one of the one in fourteen American homes that has an unacceptably high concentration of radon. Radon is a naturally occurring radioactive gas that is released from the rocks deep in the crust of the earth. Lawson Home Services offers a radon mitigation services that will leave the occupants of the home to rest a lot better knowing they have reduced their risk of developing lung cancer due to radon gas exposure.
