Planning a Green Retrofit
By Linda Mason Hunter

Photo:Patrick J. Adams

APRIL 12, 2010:
If you plan to live in your house for the next eight to ten years, a green retrofit is the greatest gift you can give it. Upgrading for energy efficiency, resource conservation, and health is the hottest trend in remodeling these days. If done well, it’s certain to increase market value and make your house sell quicker when the time comes. Until then you can enjoy a home with built-in sustainability, thus significantly lowering your carbon footprint and putting you well on the road to a green lifestyle.

It’s a trend that won’t go away. People are starting to expect some shade of green in their housing, like they used to expect a two-car garage or a certain number of bedrooms. Remodeling is greener than building from scratch because it upgrades existing housing stock to fit the goals and concerns of the 21st century. And it uses fewer materials. Nearly one-eighth of the manmade carbon dioxide in our atmosphere comes from the creation of building materials like cement, glass, concrete, and drywall, according to Dwell magazine (April 2010), the hippest newsstand source on green housing.

Be forewarned: Planning a green retrofit takes time and careful thought. It’s not like a conventional remodeling where you add on a room or upgrade a kitchen. It’s more complicated because you’re dealing with the whole structure as a living, breathing organism. Think of it as a second skin.

Before deciding to replace the furnace or install better windows, consider getting a thorough assessment, akin to a yearly medical checkup. Every house needs a baseline to show where you need to concentrate your efforts. Will it be energy efficiency? Indoor air quality? Resource conservation? Or a cost-effective blend of all three? Finding out is like putting together a big puzzle.

It’s common to think if your house is cold it needs more wall insulation, for example, when it might call for a different solution altogether. Adequate wall insulation certainly goes a long ways toward improving energy efficiency, but if your house has condensation issues, your insulation will fail. Worse, adding insulation could cause backdrafting, resulting in indoor air pollution that comprises the health of the house and its occupants.

Assessing energy performance is the foundation of a thorough house audit, requiring the services of a certified energy auditor. Insist on a blower door test which depressurizes the house to evaluate the tightness of the structure, find where leaks are occurring, and determine airflow. Don’t forget a detailed evaluation of the heating/cooling/ventilation systems. The house may have leaky ducts or an oversized furnace. A reputable auditor will provide you with a HERs (Home Energy Rater) checklist, a quantitative measurement of your home’s energy performance.

But energy efficiency does not a green house make. Your house should also be tested for radon, rates of fresh air exchange, and indoor air quality. Few companies are certified to do all these tests, so you may have to subcontract the jobs or hire a knowledgeable green contractor to supervise the project.

Best advice: Before choosing a contractor, become as knowledgeable as you can about green building. A good source of information is the Minnesota Green Star Program (www.mngreenstar.org). By developing a list of questions to ask during the interview process you’re more likely to find a more compatible fit, resulting in a more desirable outcome.

The Latest in Green Design

	For the last few years prefabricated housing has lead the way in ecological building. Why? Because it’s easier to control quality. You gain better control of the waste stream, the entire process is more efficient, and you get better indoor air quality because products aren’t allowed to sit outside getting beat up by the weather. For more information check the Web at ecohomemagazine.com, and the April 2010 issue of Dwell magazine.
	The not-so-big house is another steadily growing trend, popularized by architect Sarah Susanka’s series of design books published by Taunton Press. Though this quality-over-quantity philosophy has been around a long time, it has steadily gained momentum and is now a generally accepted practice.
	Restructured plumbing is a big step forward in water conservation. Think of all the water wasted waiting for it to heat up. Adding a low-flow faucet only increases wait time because it moves hot water slower. The answer is restructured plumbing, a new method of piping that maximizes water delivery.
	Innovative green building materials are being invented every day. Green drywall is a case in point. Regular gypsum-based drywall is not only energy intensive to manufacture, it produces copious amounts of carbon dioxide and water vapor, both greenhouse gases. EcoRock solves the problem with a technique using slag, a mineral-like solution of silicates and oxides leftover at the bottom of the furnace during during glass or steel manufacturing. Check it out on the Web at seriousmaterials.com/html/ecorock.

Linda Mason Hunter is a pioneer in the green living movement, the author of The Healthy Home: An Attic-to-Basement Guide, Green Clean, and Southwest Style.

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