Recently I was contacted by a homeowner who had been part of Beacon’s HomeSmart Renovation project. She had received a renovation plan to make her home warmer, healthier and more energy/water efficient, and she had been working through this, replacing windows and adding insulation while recladding.
Her question to me was: What kind of ventilation system do we need?
It’s an irony that as we make advances in insulating the thermal envelope to keep homes warm over winter, the need to keep homes cooler in summer is also growing. Changing climate is meaning hotter summers and combined with today’s airtight and well-insulated new homes, summer overheating is becoming an increasing problem.
Modern lifestyles, where homes are often shut up during the day, mean that coming home to a hot, overheated house is common. Once the house has become too hot, it’s much harder to cool down without using electricity.
There are two simple rules to prevent summer overheating, yet they often prove harder to put into practice:
