heating-cooling-energy / Green Building & Sustainable Home Renovation Information & Advice

What is passive solar heating and cooling? Passive heating and cooling of homes is not new. The above image is of Mesa Verde National Park, the Ancestral Puebloan cliff dwellings in Colorado, occupied from 700 to 1300 AD. This early North American settlement was shaded from the summer sun, but fully exposed to the sun ...

How to set up a home solar energy system Our future truly depends on us continuing to develop and implement renewable energy systems. In Canada, Ontario is at the forefront of that movement by offering strong financial incentives for homeowners to produce their own energy. Some of the other provinces seem to be lagging...

Homes designed for passive heating and cooling offer noticeably lower utility bills, not to mention increased comfort and security during power outages. In our humble opinion, the first thought for any home being designed or built, should be - which way is south and how do I use that knowledge to passively reduce the f...

What is radiant cooling? Radiant cooling is an alternative to typical forced air home air conditioning systems. Radiant home air conditioning involves reducing the temperature of floors, ceilings, or walls so they absorb heat from the air, rather than cooling the air itself as with normal A/C systems. By cooling surfac...

More and more homebuyers are starting to demand energy-efficient new homes and are pushing the building industry towards building better homes with lower fuel costs. Building Zero Net Energy homes is also a trending subject, and they are becoming more common as societies transition away from carbon-based economies and ...

Attic conversion: a homeowner's and pro's guide Transforming an underused attic into livable space can be one of the most rewarding home renovations because it is just waiting there for you to come and claim the space. If your home layout allows for it without much structural modification, turning attics into additiona...

Is electric heating eco-friendly? Determining whether or not electricity is an efficient and ecologically responsible means to heat a home should include the initial electricity production as well. Burning fossil fuels to fire electric power generation is only around 30-60% efficient. There is also significant loss fro...

How solar air heaters work: Solar air heater diagram © Ecohome The above diagram indicates the basic concept of a solar air heater, and while there are many designs, the basic principle is the same - a small fan feeds interior air into a south-facing wall-mounted panel. Air is heated as it passes behind a black surfa...

District heating and district energy systems: What they are and how they work District heating, also known as district energy (DE), is a large-scale, efficient, and increasingly popular method of heating and cooling buildings from a single, centralized source. For homeowners, it means reliable, low-carbon heat without ...

These wood pellet stoves need no electricity Burning wood to heat a home does not make you an eco-terrorist, let's get that one point out of the way first. Trees are a renewable resource and they are, in effect, solar energy batteries whose energy is accessed when we burn them.  After the 1998 Eastern Canada ice storm,...

Electric heating is the best option in Quebec. The downside? Winter peaks, where during cold winter days, the grid can become overloaded. Bi-energy heating systems address this problem by using another energy source, which unfortunately is often a fossil fuel. To reduce GHGs and meet environmental targets, fossil fuels...