Of mice and weatherization

Aside from a quick update on the natural gas situation, which is quite positive, I thought I’d recount some recent decisions my wife, Amanda, and I made regarding our home in Oak Park, Ill., which is just a few blocks from Chicago.

First: The U.S.Dept. of Energy Energy Information Administration’s October Short Term Energy Outlook continues an upbeat message on natural gas supply and prices heading into the heating season, i.e.:

Natural gas inventories are expected to set a new record high at the end of this year’s injection season (October 31), reaching more than 3.8 trillion cubic feet (Tcf). The projected Henry Hub annual average spot price increases from $3.85 per thousand cubic feet (Mcf) in 2009 to $5.02 in 2010.

Natural Gas. EIA expects households heating primarily with natural gas to spend an average of $105 (12 percent) less this winter. About 52 percent of all households depend on natural gas as their primary heating fuel. The 12-percent decline in natural gas expenditures reflects an 11-percent decrease in prices and a 1-percent decrease in consumption. In the Midwest, where more than 70 percent of all households rely on natural gas, a projected 15-percent decrease in average household expenditures results from an 11-percent decrease in prices and a decline in consumption of 4 percent based on the forecast of warmer weather than last winter.  

Second:  My house has a mouse. And not just a mouse, but a family of mice, and this is not good. When we bought the home in Winter 2007, Amanda and I replaced the kitchen and laundry appliances. There were “signs” of mice under the old stove, so I foamed around the gas and electrical penetrations before the new stove was installed. And I foamed up every other penetration in the kitchen as well. And most of the basement penetrations. But the mice are back and I’m on the war path.

As part of my efforts to quash the insurgency, I realized that the crawlspace under the kitchen has too many openings to fix with Good Stuff. There is no plastic vapor barrier over the dirt floor; it was installed over the floor-joist glass-fiber batts, and there’s a lot of daylight between the ground and the exterior walls. Oh, and the floor insulation was installed upside down with the vapor retarder directed toward the crawlspace floor–not the “warm side” of the construction.

This was enough work to consider the rest of the house. A retrofit return-air duct leading from the attic to the basement has a gaping bypass all the way round it, and I was quite sure that the attic insulation’s low R-value was compromised by wall-top gaps, uncapped floor joists, chimney bypasses, and plumbing/electrical penetrations… So, I called a few contractors for estimates for a full-blown weatherization project.

When we bought the house we figured it needed a good all-around weatherization effort. The pre-sale inspector pointed a few things out, but we hadn’t gotten around to fixing them (yet). The front entry door’s threshold was worn (the rubber seals were flattened) and there was a gap big enough for not only air to get by, but probably the Sunday paper. I fixed that last year with a sweep, and weather-stripped the windows, which took care of most of the drafts. But I also knew that this was only the tip of an energy ice berg. The monthly gas bills are $33 in the non-heating season; $200 in the coldest months of winter; (Update on Oct. 22: after checking the bills: the total gas bill for the Oct.-April heating season was about $1,000).

After getting a few bids,  we chose the contractor with the most experience with our type of home (1909 brick bungalow), and who had been trained by experts specifically for weatherization, including the conducting of pre/post blower door tests. the  firm also was much better at communicating than the other firms. Beyond conventional insulation and sealing, They will fix-up the crawlspace and replace two rotting entry doors in the rear of the house. Altogether, the bill will come to over $5,000. We’ll get a $1,500 rebate courtesy of Energy Policy Act (EPACT) tax credits. Here’s a link to the Dept. of Energy’s tax credit home page.

After I get the blower door results and wintertime energy bills, I’ll be able to estimate the ROI and payback. As for air conditioning and electricity, we use the basement dehumidifer more than the air conditioner, I can’t guess if we’ll see a difference there. All things considered, we might decide to use the air conditioning more because the house has been sealed and insulated.

The nut of it though is that, on a personal level, I can’t abide living in a house (for long) that is not energy efficient. We keep the thermostat set between 67 and 69 during the winter, which is hot for me and cold for Amanda. I joke that we have a set-back thermostat. I set it at one temperature and she sets it back to what she wants.

On the other hand, this project did cost us a bike tour of Tuscany, which we’ve been saving for. I said we’ll put the energy savings into a bank account and use that towards the trip. According to the DOE report I quote at the top, we’ll have 15% lower gas bills due to milder weather and cheaper gas. Add the savings from weatherization, and we’ll have the dough for that Tuscany trip in no time.

That’s what I told Amanda, but she’s not mollified. She is hunting for the mouse, and with a greater intent to kill.