Heat Leaks Two: We All Leak About the Same

Last post we looked at several infrared scans of houses and parts of houses, showing a bit of where all the heat goes, typically. In the photo above, borrowed from a home inspection site, you see all the colors of the rainbow. Remember, violet is good, and orange, red or even white are bad. From the top down, note the really bad hot spot around the plumbing stack. That could be sealed with caulk and/or foam, although the pipe, to be fair, does constantly convey warm stinky air up and out, and you'd better be glad it does.

Next note the line of heat escaping along the roof ridge. The ridge vent is a necessary architectural feature designed to keep air moving in the attic, but it shouldn't be that warm; the attic is getting too much warm air from the rooms beneath the ceiling, whether through lighting fixture penetrations, recessed lights that warm up the attic anyway, and probably the access hole to the attic, which never gets sealed the way it should.

The hot spots under the eaves and under the gable overhang are likely a combination of air leaks in a very vulnerable place of structural movement and a much nastier symptom: insulation settling over time. It's very dificult to avoid, and very difficult to correct. No one wants to damage siding or interior walls to get at the voids, so what's a homeowner to do? There are retrofits that work, as Bob Vila explains in the link. Fibers or foam can be inserted in the cavities; the work leaves small holes easily repaired and painted out.

The only other remarkable features of the house in question are the hot spots all around windows, due to framing leaks and radiant losses, and around the door, where the lack of weatherstripping is all too obvious.

This house has most of the typical flaws; it's a typical house. Without getting deeply into having a full-on energy audit of your own house, unless your utility does them for free, you can safely pursue the usual suspects. Shoot foam into foundation and sill cracks, caulk gaps under baseboards, apply sticky-on weatherstripping to entry doors and frequently used windows, seal up attic access with plastic or foam board, and do something smart with those windows, as we discussed in earlier posts. About the same things go wrong, energy-wise, to most houses. I don't like being typical, either, but following the same checklist as typical homeowners all over this land will help you to quickly and inexpensively pounce on your major heat leaks and get some energy savings going right away.