Bringing Home Savings: Picking projects that will translate into savings

Josh Silver is tackling his first project to make his home more energy-efficient, following the guidance of a home energy audit that was his starting point.

Silver is taking CBC P.E.I. along on his personal quest to make improvements at his 12-year-old Charlottetown home, to save energy and money.

Major renovations that would have cost tens of thousands of dollars are off the list because the return on his investment wouldn't be there. 

"Because he has a fairly new house, things like the walls, siding and windows, and even insulation levels, probably are not cost-effective for Josh to replace, just because of the cost to do them," said Dave Glennie, a learning manager at Holland College.

Glennie uses an energy pyramid to demonstrate the different kinds of projects that home owners can consider to save energy, and what their potential payback would be.

"There are things that you can do inexpensively and you can save," he explained. "So the payback period essentially is the quickest at the bottom of the pyramid."

At the top of the energy pyramid are the most expensive projects, such as installing solar panels and re-insulating an entire home.

"The higher up you go in the pyramid, the higher the cost and the complexity of the item that you're upgrading," Glennie said. "And typically the payback period goes up proportionally with the cost.

"The easiest fixes in Josh's case are what we call the low-hanging fruit, inexpensive items, and most of them are dealing with reducing air leakage," Glennie said. 

"Josh's house is losing about 12 percent of its heat in air leakage, so anything he can do to reduce that is a direct reduction in heat loss."

What is a gigajoule?

Another of Silver's goals is to de-mystify the energy audit report.

"One of the concerns I have with an energy audit is they tend to be fairly high level, fairly technical, and my concern would be that would scare a lot of homeowners away," Silver said. 

"I'd like to just kind of dispel those myths."

One of the terms used in the report, Silver said, is a gigajoule, which he describes a "really fancy term for how much energy we use".

His home currently uses 112 gigajoules of energy per year.

"One way to think of gigajoules is two propane tanks. These two tanks would last me about a year," Silver said, hoisting two tanks.

"Another way of thinking of it is [the] oil tank that most of us have in our home. That would be 70 of these propane tanks, worth 35 gigajoules."

Silver said the ultimate goal would be to reduce a home's energy use to zero gigajoules.

"That would be the goal for everyone. That would be the best for our environment and, of course, the best for your pocketbook," Silver said.

"That takes prior planning, a significant amount of planning, and [it] would frankly cost too much to get this house up to that level."

Better insulated, better sealed

One of Silver's first projects was to add insulation and a better seal on his attic hatch. 

"Our attic hatch is really important. By code, we have to have an attic hatch, so all of you have one in your home," Silver said.

"It's a really easy thing to overlook. Unless there's a massive problem, you probably have never been in your attic hatch.

"The problem with that is there's so much warm moist air in your house and it's so cold and dry in your attic that the energy in your house can lift up that hatch, and then you have a wide-open door that's leaking energy," Silver said 

"Think of your front door just being a piece of plywood. That would not be acceptable."

After the audit, Silver added three layers of foam to his attic hatch: two layers of closed cell foam, which is typically blue or pink, called Celfort, as well as a layer of expanded polystyrene, wrapped in foil.

He also attached a layer of gasket sealer, which is hollow pliable foam, around the perimeter of his attic hatch. It crushes down and makes a positive seal when the hatch is closed, with the seal further reinforced by installing two sets of hooks and eyes.

"This is a significant upgrade that I did for about $3, and it would save me about $10 a month," Silver said, pointing out that the $10 monthly saving will continue for the lifetime of the home. 

"It's a significant, very easy upgrade that I would suggest anybody can handle." 

In our next episode, Silver will show us how to install foam gaskets in electrical outlets and light switches, to stop more leakage of air and energy.

  Note: As well as being a homeowner in search of savings, Josh Silver is the learning manager for the heritage retrofit carpentry program at Holland College. 

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