Video: Sealing Our Net Zero House

This is the second segment of our premiere Pitney Passive House film called Air Sealing, or as I like to call it:

How I Found Love At 50 Pascals
or
We Know Who Left the Shiner In Our Master Bedroom!

As John Mead explains in this segment, one of the tests our house had to pass for official Passive House certification was the blower door test. This test calculates the leakage rate or air tightness of our house. A big blower is inserted into the front door cavity, the home is pressurized to 50 Pascals of air pressure and the leakage is calculated in Air Changes/Hour. Very well constructed conventional homes test at 4-6 ACH. Ours had to meet the Passive House U.S.A. standard of .6 ACH. We did the high fives and happy dances when we passed the test with flying colors at .51 ACH!!! Now just one caution for those of you eager to tell this story to your brother and sister contractors, say, under the influence at the staff Christmas Party. Don’t confuse Pascals with Pavlovs. This may conjure up images of our house pressurized with dog saliva, setting back the passive house movement a few light years and causing your listeners to spew their wassail and cheep pretzels onto the office floor.

You will hear John Mead explain what a shiner means in carpenter lingo, when the hammer jockey or the guy with the power driver misses the stud with a nail or screw. We actually do know who’s responsible for the shiner John actually points out in this segment. It is permanently encrypted in the stud wall directly behind the head of the bed in which we sleep every night. We do know where this particular carpenter and his/her family lives, but have no current plans for retaliation. After all, she/he did have the good sense to follow protocol and not remove it! Finally, pay attention to what John means by the belt and suspenders approach. It’s the kind of approach we need to be taking in response to climate change, so we and our descendants can live. Now, enjoy the movie!!!