cor / Green Building & Sustainable Home Renovation Information & Advice

...cords? All vehicles can connect to 240-volt outlets using standard plugs, but cords will vary in length from one model to another. Be sure that the cord of any charger you purchase will be able to reach your car’s charging port. The cost of cable such as this is fairly pricey, so you will find that 15-foot cables are m...

Cork flooring, pros & cons Cork is a renewable resource, harvested from trees without killing them. Although it comes from far away (mostly Portugal), its carbon footprint from transportation is quite reasonable given that it is light-weight and can be made very thin - so a lot packs into a shipping container. Cork...

...corporated shading to avoid overheating in summer. It also had lots of insulation, with the building envelope made up of R40 walls, an R60 ceiling, and triple glaze windows. It was extremely airtight (even by today's standards) and most importantly, because it proved that Passive House and Passive Solar designs could w...

...cording to the UN Secretary-General, “reflects the interests, the contradictions, and the state of political will in the world today”. Or in other words:  How COP26 turned into a cop-out The image that will remain in my mind, is that of a distinguished and grown man, COP26 President Alok Sharma, struggling to hold back...

Vapor Barrier + Air-Con = Damp Moldy Walls So here's a little known fact that most HVAC installers won't tell a potential new client for central air; Polyethylene vapor barriers in combination with air conditioning in homes can rot walls because of the condensation they may cause. This is why if you have a newer home w...

...Cornwall, Oshawa, Peterborough and there’s a few in Toronto. There is even one in Mont Tremblant, Quebec where we charged up on a ski trip. Finding them isn’t hard because your car tells you where they are and it knows your range, so it’s kind of idiot proofed.  Tesla Charging station in Montreal © Ecohome Are chargi...

...correct (or correct enough). But, if different installers recommend slightly different sizes, we would suggest suggest erring on the side of the smaller model. The ACCA guidelines even suggest it’s OK to undershoot the Manual J estimate by 10 percent. Just ensure that the particular heat pump selected and installed is ...

1. Life without a car. One of the nice things about living in the city is public transportation and proximity to services, which makes it possible to live without a car. Or at the very least, it can reduce the amount of driving you have to do. When choosing a place to live, check the walking distances from buses or sub...

A new cement block manufacturing process developed by an American company named Solidia Technologies® produces 40% fewer emissions during manufacturing than conventional concrete, resulting in a dramatically lower environmental footprint. Solidia’s concrete is formulated with less lime and is cured at lower temperature...

...cording to Christie Gamble, the Director of Sustainability at CarbonCure, the Canadian company behind this innovation, this technique does not require any change in the production procedure, and allows ready-mix firms to use less Portland cement. “Operationally, it is very simple,” she said. “It’s essentially the same ...

...correctly called fossil gas, as pointed out recently by Edgar Dearden, sustainable home designer with GNAR Inc in Whistler BC when he wrote to us about the size of the challenge to eradicate the use of natural gas for home heating. As I explained, there's only one problem with calling the gas that arrives in our homes ...