February | 2014

Making Energy Efficient Improvements to your home is one of the best investments you can make as a homeowner, but sometimes these improvements can be cost prohibitive, and inconvenient. Fortunately, your Fort Collins Utility company is here to help! Fort Collins Utilities offer inclusive rebates to help make your home more comfortable at a fraction of the market cost! This program has been so successful, in fact, that the Northern Colorado Business Report has just announced that the Southwest Energy Efficiency Project has awarded Fort Collins Utilities with the Energy Efficiency Leadership Award for its, “Highly Effective energy efficiency programs that are exceeding energy savings goals.”

In order to be eligible for the Home Energy Efficiency program, you must be a Fort Collins Utility Electric customer. You must have first completed a home energy audit. Your home must be a single-family home or a townhome. Multifamily homes are not included in the rebate program. Because home installations are NOT eligible for a rebate, all work must be completed by a city approved contractor. Improvements on new construction such as in additions or remodels, typically do not qualify for rebates, with a few exceptions. For more information about the Fort Collins Utilities rebate program, Please visit: http://www.fcgov.com/utilities/residential/conserve/energy-efficiency/home-efficiency-program/eligibility-steps

Or call the friendly professionals at This Efficient House to schedule and energy audit or estimate!

Home Energy Audit
A home energy audit is the best way to determine the levels of performance for your home. During the test, the building shell is examined as the technician depressurizes your home using a blower door and then walks through with an infrared camera. The blower door exagerates the leaky portions of the house, and the camera makes them visible. Qualified technicians will provide you with a report that outlines the areas of improvement that are specific to your home including reccommendations about areas of highest to lowest priority!
A home energy audit is a wonderful place to start when considering energy-efficient improvements to make to your home, and can help inform your decision making process. The home energy audit that is conducted by a city approved contractor includes a blower door test, an infared camera scan, and a combustion safety test. Recieving a home energy audit is the first step in participating in the Fort Collins Utilities Rebate program.
Energy Advisors are trained professionals who are happy to:
Answer Questions about Improving the efficiency of your home
Discuss priorities for Energy Saving Opportunities
Review your Audit Report
Identify the best improvement opportunities based on your budget
Obtain and Review contractor’s bids
Discuss availible Rebates
Connect you with ON-bill financing opportunities

To be connected with an Energy Advisor or to learn more about the city sponsored rebate program, Please Contact Fort Collins Utilities at:
http://www.fcgov.com/utilities/contact-us

Your Home Energy Audit will include a report prioritizing the energy efficient improvements and availible rebates. This allows you to select the improvements that will be right for your family.

In order to be a participating contractor for the City of Fort Collins Utilities company, a contracting business must meet a few requirements. These include attendence of a two-hour orientation to familiarize the contractor with the rebate program and receive contractor resources. They must attend a training for the area in which they would like to be listed. Additionally, approved contractors must maintain accredidation with the Better Business Buereau as well as meeting the citiy’s standard insurance requirements.

To learn more about selecting a city approved contractor, you can utilize this tool:

http://www.fcgov.com/utilities/residential/conserve/energy-efficiency/home-efficiency-program/contractors

Participating contractors can even submit the rebate application materials for you, making your home effiiciency project run as smoothly and easily as possible!

For more information about the Fort Collins Utilities Rebate Program, please contact the City of Fort Collins: (970) 212-2900
Or email: http://www.fcgov.com/utilities/contact-us/e-mail-utilities

To Schedule an audit or estimate with This Efficient House, Please Call (970) 204-9931 or email info@thisefficienthouse.com

Together, we can make your home energy Efficient, and keep your family warm and comfortable this weinter!

We all know that leaky houses are harder to heat and cool. Air leakage lead to uncomfortable homes that are hard to heat and cool, wasting money and energy for the homeowner. Additionally, homes with higher air leakage are prone to damage from condensing cold spots that attract mold and rot, as well as frozen pipes in the winter.

Before you can set out to fix air leaks in your home, however, you first have to find them. By far the most common method of determining the location of leaks in your home is the Blower Door test. Blower door tests have been an essential tool for the energy efficient builder for years now, but recently, changes in the International Residential Code makes blower door testing the new standard, and sets out regulations for air tightness of buildings dependent upon climate zone.

To schedule a blower door test for your home today, please contact This Efficient House, your local, energy-efficient Contracting company! info@thisefficenthouse.com

My beautiful picture What is A Blower Door Test?

In 1970’s researchers in Sweden, Saskatchewan, and New Jersey began to study how air leakage affected the overall energy efficiency of a home. This led to the development of the first blower door by two teams of researchers, one of which included Harold Orr, who is generally credited with their invention.

The standard blower door includes a powerful, variable speed fan which is connected to a two-channel, digital manometer (an air pressure gauge). This last piece of equipment measures both indoor and outdoor air pressure. The blower door fan depressurizes the house by pulling inside air out until the manometer registers typically a 50-pascal difference between the external and internal air pressure. The amount of fan-power and air flow that it takes to generate and hold this difference can then be used to measure how tight or leaky the house is.
The results of the blower door test are often expressed in cfm50, which is the airflow at a pressure difference of 50 Pascals. These data can be extrapolated to calculate air changes per hour, or the number of times all of the air in a structure will be completely replaced by outside air every hour. In Colorado, a Zone 5 state, the 2012 IRC requires that a building meet a standard of fewer than 3 air changes every hour. This Efficient House has a team of experts on staff to help YOU discover whether or not your home meets these requirements.

Chasing Air Leaks audit1

Air infiltration is one of the main factors that can compromise a building’s energy economy, durability and comfort. A blower door test can provide an added benefit: there is no better way to locate and seal up air leaks! During the depressurization, the air leaks in walls, rim joists and attics are exaggerated. scanning the seams of a building with an thermal imaging camera can allow an insulation technician or a homeowner to easily see and identify areas of air infiltration by locating unusual hot or cold areas within the building. This Efficient House specializes in blower door test informed air sealing, and we would be happy to speak with you about the best approach to air sealing your home.

A home energy audit is a great place to start if you are considering an energy efficient remodel. This Efficient House offers Home Energy audits to help get you on track to start saving money and energy today! Rebates are even available to those who qualify. For more information about the energy audit process, Fort Collins Utilities or Xcel Energy rebate programs, contact This Efficient House, and We’ll be happy to help you out!

Call (970) 204-9931 or email info@thisefficienthouse.com to schedule your audit or estimate today! This Efficient House is a local, dependable energy company, and we thank you for your support!

References

Armanda, Larry. “Blower Door Testing.” The Best of Fine Homebuilding. Winter 2014: 110-116. print.

http://energy.gov/energysaver/articles/blower-door-tests
Bailes, Allison B. III. “What’s a Blower Door Good For? Hint: its not air changes per hour!” Building Science. December 12, 2012. http://www.greenbuildingadvisor.com/blogs/dept/building-science/what-s-blower-door-good

Monthly Archives: February 2014

Congratulations to Fort Collins Utilities!

Air Leakage Reduction: Not Just a Lot of Hot Air

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