October 10th, 2018
Renovations of older, distressed homes throughout the city of Cleveland are meeting improved green standards because of incentive programs and funding opportunities that encourage better building. But what will it take for existing homes to achieve more dramatic energy reductions in line with evolving energy codes and standards? Can we achieve deep energy reductions cost-effectively in affordable housing? We wanted to find out. Over the past two years at Environmental Health Watch (EHW), we managed a HUD-funded technical study of green retrofits of 12 affordable homes.
Six of the houses were upgraded to EHW’s deep energy retrofit (DER) specs to achieve at least 70% energy-use reductions. The other six were renovated to Cleveland’s “Green Building Standard,” which included affordable green housing standards established by Enterprise Community Partners (greencommunitiesonline .org) and energy-efficiency standards set by Energy Star v.2. We are monitoring energy usage (actual vs. predicted) and indoor air quality (IAQ) in all 12 homes. This HUD technical study has two purposes: 1) to compare the effects on indoor air quality of deep energy retrofits and Energy Star v.2 retrofits, and 2) to determine the costs and bene-fits of deep energy retrofits for affordable housing. We are in the data-collection phase of the study now. The construction work is complete, so we can share our experience with implementing the DERs and our thoughts on the challenges and opportunities presented by these types of retrofits.