No, those are not plastic igloos that you see in the photo above, but temporary winter structures called Tempo. As you can see in the photo, and if you caught the TV show you saw even more, there are Tempos as far as you could see in every direction. Most people use them as a temporary garage, ...
In Canada, other than on the lower mainland of British Columbia and on Sable Island, it is impossible to maintain a comfortable level of humidity in the house and not have frost on single-pane windows most of the winter.Using two panes of glass allows the inner pane to be warmer than the outer on...
The EcoEnergy program of homeowner grants to help retrofit homes has been brought back to life by the federal government in late September of 2011 -- part of the EcoAction initiative. I love this program and the hard workers at NRCan have done a great job of organizing it, explaining it and ma...
Ventilation in a Canadian attic does very little to remove moisture when the temperature in the attic is below freezing. During that time, the moisture is in the form of Ice and the passing air simply won't remove it -- whether you have passive vents or power vents. When things warm up, if the ...
Water-source heat pumps work the same as any other heat pump in principle, but instead of having a radiator sitting outdoors, a pump pulls water out of some underground water source or lake, runs it through a radiator inside your basement, and dumps it into a second well in the ground or back int...
When there is morning frost or light snow on a roof, you can learn a lot about a heat losses from the house and how to eliminate ice dams and icicles.
What causes problems
Melting the bottom of a snow pack or melting off all snow at the crown of the roof sends water down under the snow to ...
Shrink to fit winter windows are really great draft stoppers and energy savers for old windows and patio doors.
Plastic has almost no R-value
Since plastic and glass have no real R-value, the dead air space created between the plastic and the window is as good as can be created with another ...
Michael writes from St. Lazare, Quebec : We recently found a nasty surprise with our new house. The land has a high water table and as a result we have sump pump in the basement. The plumbing for this pump was hidden in the walls and ceiling of the basement. When our inspector inspected the home,...
Some rooms are colder than others, or a forced air system works well for heating but not air conditioning. Although such problems may require repositioning ductwork, or adding booster fans -- the first thing to check is that the ductwork is balanced and balanced differently for the two differ...
In all too many new houses, there is a seasonal problem where in the winter the ceiling actually lifts itself right off the wall in the centre of the house, and then settles down after the heating season. Even in some older houses this goes on every year.
What causes this crack?
Avoiding...
