Home energy efficiency involves more than having the most efficient heating and cooling systems and appliances. Your home’s building envelope also has a sizable impact on its energy efficiency. Understanding the role the building envelope plays in improving efficiency can help you save energy and stay comfortable year-round.
Components of Your Home’s Building Envelope
The building envelope encompasses four key components of your home’s overall structure: the foundation, roof, flooring, and interior and exterior walls.
The key to improving home energy efficiency involves improving your home’s building envelope. That involves placing your focus on the following critical areas:
- Insulation – Proper use of fiberglass batt and foam insulation within exterior walls and attics provides your home with a high resistance against outside temperatures, as well as unintended air leakage.
- Sealing – Caulking and weatherstripping around windows and other areas where crevices commonly form is another good strategy for improving the building envelope.
- Moisture control – Measures should be taken to prevent moisture from infiltrating through foundations and exterior walls in basements and lower floors. This includes the use of drainage planes to help redirect rainwater runoff away from the home.
These crucial measures can help improve home energy efficiency, as well as overall comfort for you and other occupants.
To learn more about improving your home’s energy efficiency, contact the pros at Ace Hardware Home Services, Inc. We’ve provided top-notch HVAC service to Dayton homeowners since 1978.
Our goal is to help educate our customers in Dayton, Ohio about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems).
Credit/Copyright Attribution: “Dragun3d/Shutterstock”
