High Performing Lumber

rSTUD Increases Wall Insulation Performance

A dirty little secret in the building industry is that the promised r-value of a wall is usually just a measure of the cavity insulation in a perfect installation. Often the installation of insulation is not perfect, but just as important is the fact that the studs in the wall often leak a lot of energy through thermal bridging. The rSTUD is a new product developed to make a wall’s framing every bit as insulative as the high-end insulation that fills it. It’s 4 times more energy-efficient than conventional lumber and can reduce heat loss transmitted via a wall’s assembly by 85%.

Efficient insulation is all about the numbers, so lets take a look at what the rSTUD has to offer. The 2×6 has an r-value of 21 which makes it 3 times the efficiency of a typical 2×6 fir board rated at r 7.7. As framing can compose up to 20% of the total surface of a given wall, the real world r-value of the wall system will only be 3/4 of what is advertised. Headers, the beams that go across doors and windows, are also available with the dense pack insulation in-between structural members. Many builders make headers with foam insulation in-between the wood on-site, so this is not as ground breaking.

The rSTUD is not cheap, but like most things in building you have to look at the big picture to appreciate the benefits. If the wall is insulated with very expensive expanded foam, the real r-value of the wall system is maintained with this product rather than degraded by up to 20% through thermal bridging. This may also eliminate the need to foam the outside of the wall. The price can also be reduced with the good, old-fashioned practice of advanced framing or Optimum Value Engineering (OVE), which ironically is relatively simple and can reduce 5-15% of the framing. With demand for highly isolative building envelopes becoming more normal, especially as Passivhaus and other systems become more common, products like this will be critical.

rSTUD

Happy (Green) Thanksgiving

Top Green Thanksgiving Day Tips


1.   know your guests
2.   plan your meal
3.   shop for your staples and non-perishable items
4.   clean house
5.   decorate lightly
6.   shop for perishables and pick up your turkey
7.   pre-fab as much prep as you can
8.   cook like you've never cooked before
9.   give thanks
10. dispose of the leftovers

more details HERE + turkey impact

REPLENSIH Spray Bottle Could Disrupt Home Cleaning Market

Innovative, Reusable "Replenish" Spray Bottle Could Disrupt Home Cleaning Market

We love to tout sustainability in the consumer sector, but of the 60 billion pounds of plastic discarded annually, only 7 percent is recycled—meaning that billions of pounds end up in landfills. That said, recycling shouldn't be our only objective; the other Rs (reduce and reuse) should be our primary targets.

That's where Replenish comes in. The company rightly describes its new spray bottle as a "disruptive" product: Its reusable spray bottle is made of a sturdy, durable PET-1 plastic, meaning you don't have to replace it (though every part of it is recyclable). At the bottom of the bottle is an interchangeable "twist-on concentrate pod." To use it, you simply attach the pod to the bottle, flip it upside down, squeeze the pod until the internal measurement cup is full, and add with water. Each pod contains four bottles' worth of concentrate, and each time you buy a refill, you're not only reducing plastic waste, you're also saving money on packaging.


"When you buy a spray bottle of normal household cleaner," says founder Jason Foster, "you're basically paying for water and plastic. I kept thinking, why are we wasting money and resources shipping water and plastic. Replenish is a drastic reduction on both counts."

An added bonus is that, once stores start carrying it, they can store far more inventory of pods on their shelves—making it a win for consumers, retailers, and the environment.

Replenish

BBQs saving the planet

Could backyard BBQs save the planet?


Backyard cooking usually invokes a cloud of smoke hovering over both barbeque and cooker, hardly presenting an image of eco-friendly earth practices. But The Guardian reports barbecues can in fact help flight climate change with just a few simple steps. Recently, climate change expert Durwood Zaelke pointed out that barbecues can be rigged to generate rather than consume energy, all through the use of biochar.


Biochar is an extremely stable type of charcoal that is made from heating crop wastes, wood or other biomasses. It creates energy instead of consuming it, as it releases more combustible gases than needed to produce heat. In some parts of the world, a special stove creates biochar, turning it into a charcoal that can be mixed into soils to boost crops. This process allows the captured carbon in the biochar to "sequester" for thousands of years in the soil. In the meantime, it boosts crop productivity. Biochar contains microscopic pores great for housing helpful bacteria and fungi for soil nutrients.

Zaelke, who is president of the Institute for Governance and Sustainable Development, believes that these outdoor ovens could be applied on a large scale throughout the westernized world. As he told the Guardian, "Done on a wide scale, this could help people of all political persuasions to painlessly do their bit to tackle climate change, at the same time as adding to the productivity of their gardens."
Zaelke focuses his efforts on reducing the quick-warming chemicals that go into our air. Black carbon, methane tropospheric ozone and hydrofluorcarbons all warm the planet much as carbon dioxide does. But unlike carbon dioxide, which is warming the planet over a thousand years, they do so in short bursts and then cool down. As Zaelke points out, cutting them out from the atmosphere may promote cooler temperatures more quickly.

Further, using a biochar barbeque would in fact help suck CO2 out of the air and return it to the soil, where it could enhance crops. While it would be on a smaller scale, experts believe that if sufficient amounts of biochar were produced, the planet could reduce CO2 in the atmosphere. In the meantime, crops would be enhanced to the point of increased food production. And as Zaelke points out to the Guardian with a wink, "It would help make sure my environmental friends don't criticize me when I'm grilling my steak."

via The Guardian