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Coolearth Summer Retreat
Last Thursday the Coolearth team held their Summer Retreat at our Parry Sound office. It was a brilliantly sunny and hot day on Georgian Bay as we gathered for the retreat. We discussed how the year had gone, what was on each of our plates, shared ideas, and brainstormed for the future. These retreats are important […]
Read moreRepost: OBC Stop the Foot Dragging on Air Leakage Testing
Our friends over at Blue Green Group made a post recently that highlighted how air leakage in high performance homes should be more closely integrated into the Ontario Building Code’s SB-12 Section, as well as how more training amongst professionals and builders is needed to implement already existing technology and techniques for air tightness. See […]
Read moreOccupant Behaviour and Net-zero Design
The focus of this blog post is on how occupant behaviour effects designing buildings for net-zero. The topic of user-behaviour and net-zero design came up when we were analyzing the Passive House Planning Package (PHPP) energy modelling software for a net-zero energy envelope retrofit project this week. We noticed that the clothes dryer used close to 20% of […]
Read moreChanges to Ontario Building Code SB-12
New changes in the Supplementary SB-12 “Energy Efficiency for Housing” section of the Ontario Building Code were announced on July 7, 2016. These changes, which come into effect January 1st, 2017 and include: – New prescriptive compliance packages that provide minimum 15 per cent energy efficiency improvement over existing packages – Drain water heat recovery units […]
Read morePassive Solar Design in Ontario
Passive Solar Homes are gaining popularity once again, having first emerged into general public consciousness in the 1970’s. Defined succinctly by the US Department of Energy: passive solar design takes advantage of a building’s site, climate, and materials to minimize energy use. In a “heating climate” like ours, where the major demand on the buildings […]
Read moreOntario’s Climate Action Plan and Homes
“Climate change is a fact in our daily lives — raising the cost of our food, causing extreme weather that damages property and infrastructure, threatening outdoor activities we love, and melting winter roads that provide critical seasonal access to remote northern Indigenous communities. It affects every aspect of our lives, so it is our collective […]
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