Research Reports are technical reports written for researchers but accessible to design professionals and builders. These reports typically provide an in-depth study of a particular topic or describe the results of a research project. They are often peer reviewed and also provide support for advice given in our Building Science Digests. The most recent documents posted are at the top of the list below.
Using four Building Science Consortium Building America community-scale projects, this paper investigates the nature, strength, and durability of connections between high performance dwellings and developments.
Roofs can be designed and constructed to be either vented or unvented in any hygrothermal zone. Air barrier systems are typically the most common approach, however, air pressure control approaches are becoming more common especially in cases involving remedial work on existing structures.
Air barriers are systems of materials used to control airflow in building enclosures. They typically completely enclose the air within a building.
High performance compact fluorescent lighting (CFLs) is not just about energy savings; it’s also about the other aspects of performance such as color rendering.
When designing a building’s envelope and its interaction with the mechanical system, temperature, humidity, rain and the interior climate often are ignored.
Buildings leak water and air, which is normal and unavoidable. Therefore, designers should not fixate on preventing leakage, i.e. making buildings “airtight.” Because even if all cracks were sealed, buildings have doors and windows.
Energy efficient homes are inherently airtight and require ventilation for acceptable indoor air quality. Recognizing this fact, two building code jurisdictions, the federal department of Housing and Urban Development and the State of Washington, require mechanical ventilation for homes.
What relative humidity should I have in my home? Seems like a simple enough question. However, the answer can sometimes be difficult to understand.
Ventilation air change rate, local mean age-of-air, and interzonal ventilation air distribution were measured for two single-family homes and eight ventilation systems.
Development and testing were conducted for a prototype phase-change material (PCM) wallboard to enhance the thermal energy storage capacity of buildings with particular interest in peak load shifting.
Two moisture-storage coating mixtures developed and tested between late 1990 and early 1991 could provide a low-cost, building-integrated method of managing indoor humidity in hot and humid climates.
A comprehensive literature review was made to investigate whole house ventilation system options, various simulation and engineering analysis tools and techniques, and baselines for comparing the current project results.
This paper discusses the differences between vented, unvented and conditioned crawlspaces. Best practice construction techniques and assemblies for conditioned crawlspaces are discussed, the results of a field monitoring program are presented, and the code language addressing crawlspaces is explained.
Americans have been building homes with wood—shaping logs, joining timbers, nailing studs—for almost 400 years. Our current approach, stick framing, grew poplular in the mid-1800's because it too less skill, required simpler tools, and took fewer people than timber framing. We apparently really like waste haulers, too.
With rising utility cost, concerns over availability of natural resources, and environmental impacts of our energy production and use, a push has been made to design buildings to minimize energy consumption in an attempt to work towards more sustainable communities. Creating more thermally efficient building enclosures is a necessary part of achieving this goal. The thermal resistance provided by insulating a stud cavity is limited by the standard framing sizes currently used in the United States and Canada. The options therefore are to either increase the depth of the studs used, add insulation to the interior of the wall assembly, or to add extra insulation to the exterior of the assembly. Providing rigid insulating sheathing to the exterior of a wall assembly is a technique that has been used in cold climates for more than 40 years. Recently it has begun to be integrated into enclosure designs in all climates. As with any newly adopted technology, there can be concerns for its proper application. This paper examines methods of incorporating insulating sheathing into the thermal and moisture management systems of the building enclosure in a variety of climate zones across North America. This is done through examining the material properties of the various products and how these properties can be used to achieve an energy efficient and durable building enclosure design, while avoiding problems relating moisture accumulation and degradation of materials.
This paper examines methods of using hygrothermal models, primarily WUFI, to assess the impact of energy efficient enclosure upgrades on the durability of historical buildings. Means of producing and choosing input data for the hygrothermal simulation are discussed. Methods for using the hourly results from the simulations to generate a corrosion index and a freeze-thaw count are developed. An example wall is used to demonstrate the type of output that can be expected and how this can be used in making retrofit design decisions.
This is a test form used in the Building America program to ascertain house performance and specifications.
SNAPSHOT stands for Short, Non-destructive Approach to Provide Significant House Operation Thresholds.
Exposure to sunlight (ultraviolet radiation) and moisture are the major factors affecting the durability of paint coatings and the durability of the substrate.
Good design and practice involve controlling the wetting of building assemblies from both the exterior and interior and different climates require different approaches.
