[Greenbuilding] please rant: thar she blows

Fri Apr 13 00:23:50 CDT 2007

Dear Peter,

  I understand your pain associated with search engines and advanced building energy design strategies, but alas, large forces conspire to ensure you never learn of its existence.  The rejection design strategy is your basic beer cooler, it has an inside environment, an outside environment and the general idea is to insulate between the two.  The more insulation, the better the beer cooler; Right? 

  An interactive building energy design strategy is more like a living system, plants, the human body, even ecosystems.  There is an inside environment, an outside environment and the general idea is to create an interactive thermodynamic link between the two.  Think of the skin on your arm as the buildings envelope, the bones in your arm as the structural system and the veins and arteries as its heating and cooling system.  All working together to constantly interact with the environment that surrounds it, such that it maintains what is going on inside within a prescribed temperature range.  We could add ERV displacement ventilation (the Lungs), eyes, nose, ...even the mind.

  The 'we could" part goes on and on if one chooses the interactive design strategy, but as soon as the rejection model is prescribed, the gig is up.  If you build it, its functionally non-sustainable.  It can never support life without some artificial means of ventilating, heating, cooling and humidification, and in practice, never delivers a safe, healthy and comfortable indoor living environment...but that is another story.

  The point being that when looking at R2000 and associated functionally non-sustainable junk, they only work when plugged in. If they are not plugged in, then mother nature prescribes that two of every three days they exists, it will be to hot or to cold, to dry or to humid, and never healthy to occupy. Yes we can expand the prescribed comfort zone, live with the windows open, invite all manner of vermin and blight into our homes, but if we do this, then our homes are really fancy tents.

  Or you could choose an interactive design strategy, in which case, energy efficiency matters, insulation matters, how the building is orientated matters, what surrounds it matters, what it sits on matters, how its connected to its environment, matters. Choose the rejection model, nothing matters, except the poor choice you made to start with.

  I'd like to take credit for all of these insights, but it was really John Straube who got me thinking a decade ago and the principal reason I joined this list serve.  A friend sent me one of his posts and I though I would stir the pot somewhat with some advanced thought.

  But you guys seem to be taking this green/LEED building gig and yourselves really serious, which probably means I am wasting my time with you.  But if you or anyone else is really interested in what cutting edge is all about, I could pass along some reading material/links?

  Again, just a thought!

  AOF

"Kidd, Peter" <jpkidd at hydro.mb.ca> wrote:
  Hate being thick headed in the morning, but googling on "rejection
building energy design" leads me nowhere relevant to the heating
dominated climate I live in. What is the fundamental design problem to
which you refer. Or what is unsustainable about the design principles
in R2000 and beyond? 

-----Original Message-----
From: greenbuilding-bounces at listserv.repp.org
[mailto:greenbuilding-bounces at listserv.repp.org] On Behalf Of
Christophor Faust
Sent: Thursday, April 12, 2007 2:38 AM
To: Mike O'Brien; Greenbuilder list
Subject: Re: [Greenbuilding] please rant: thar she blows

Dear Mike,

I was following the link, "please rant" more so than attacking the
rejection building energy design strategy. But you do make a good
point, "ad homonym argument is not evidence", and I would be very
interested in any evidence you might present to demonstrate that
anything I might have said, is anything but fact, and would not be the
least bit offensive to anyone who might fairly consider them and their
implications!

Is there any amount of insulation that might improve a rejection
model's design performance beyond one of there days within the human
comfort zone? How about R=100,000,000.?
Is there any amount of energy efficiency that might improve a
rejection model's design performance beyond one of three days within the
human comfort zone? How about EE= 100%?
Is there any combination of energy efficiency and insulation might
improve the durability of a non-sustainable design strategy? How about
EE=100% & R=100,000,000?

If the answer to all of these questions are NO. Then, I would argue
you should lighten up and let me "please rant" about what the very
beautiful mind and my old friend John Straube seems to have forgotten,
"its all about design strategy; what we are trying to do". While John
is absolutely right, R2000 & Super-E homes are more comfortable than
their older Japanese counterparts, lots more. But this comfort comes
with a price; non-sustainability, as overall building energy performance
has almost nothing to do with insulation and energy efficiency. My point
was that we should all hope the Japanese are never subjected to such a
mediocre level of performance, as designed non-sustainability. 

While finding my thoughts funny might be a stretch for you, I am
reluctant to accept offensive, ...all things considered.

Just a thought?

AOF

Mike O'Brien wrote:
Hello, Christopher-- 

I found your comments offensive. If you have criticisms, please back
them up with facts. Your ad hominem argument is not evidence.

Mike O'Brien

On Apr 11, 2007, at 7:33 PM, Christophor Faust wrote:

One can only hope that the Japanese never have to endure the second
rate mentality that would seal a home and wrap it in a "good blanket of
insulation" in the name of durability and energy efficiency. R2000 &
Super-E homes are non-sustainable junk and one can only surmise that
those who advocate such dribble, have spent too much time in sealed
rooms with little or no ventilation. 

Where is that bright star of let's "solve the fundamental problem"
while we can? 

Suffering from too much cheap recirculation ventilation? 

AOF

John Straube wrote:
I have worked on energy efficient houses in Japan, and the reason
they heat
only certain rooms is that their houses are incredibly air and heat
leaky. A
well insulated, airtight home will use less energy than a Japanese
(and
formerly British and New Zealand) room-by-room heater approach. When
the
Japanese consumer finds out how comfortable and cheap it is to live in
a
R2000 or Super-E house, they don't want to live in an old Japanese
house. 
Wrapping all occupied space in a good blanket of insulation is the
most
practical solution to both durability and energy efficiency

Dr John Straube
Associate Professor
Dept of Civil Engineering & School of Architecture
University of Waterloo
www.johnstraube.ca
Waterloo, Ont., Canada
www.civil.uwaterloo.ca/beg

-----Original Message-----
From: greenbuilding-bounces at listserv.repp.org
[mailto:greenbuilding-bounces at listserv.repp.org] On Behalf Of Alan
Abrams
Sent: Monday, April 09, 2007 07:56
To: wmdorsett at sbcglobal.net; 'John Salmen'; 'Greenbuilder list'
Subject: [Greenbuilding] please rant: thar she blows

apartment who said how odd it was that we Muricans heat the whole
space of
our houses. Koichi explained that in Tokyo people wear coats indoors
and
drop the temperatures of their homes to the point of seeing their
breath. >

we mur'kins were once wiser; as Ishmael observed to Queequeg, misty
mouthed
and huddled in a shared bed in a decrepit Nantucket rooming house on a
blustery winter night, "to be truly warm, some part of you must be
cold."
Lisa Heshong develops that notion in her recent delightful tract,
"Thermal
Delight."

But insulating the basement ceiling--a theoretically sound concept--is
subject to the practical difficulty of insulating the stairwell and
adjacent
door. As we reduce the overall footprint of the house, we fight
headroom
requirements, shaving every possible inch out of the sections of
landings
and carriages. And as often as not, we also create habitable space in
our
basements. So it still strikes me as reasonable to insulate the
basement
and capture the heat of the water heater and heating equipment. 

Alan Abrams

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