When Barbara Williamson purchased her first home about eight years ago, it was a source of pride. Then summer after summer took its toll on her air conditioner.
“I was spending a lot of money keeping the air conditioner running, so I just couldn’t afford to do it anymore,” she said.
Temporary fixes weren’t cutting it and she couldn’t afford a replacement either, so Williamson said she just did her best to cope.
“It was hot, very uncomfortable because I didn’t have any air and I had to use fans to keep cool during the day and at night,” she said. “I really couldn’t have a lot of friends over.”
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She got in touch with Blue Ridge Community Action and found out she qualified for their weatherization assistance program. Blue Ridge sent over contractors and energy auditors to diagnose and fix the issues and they discovered the AC was just a part of the problem.
Like many older homes throughout Charlotte, Williamson’s home was in need of upgrades that would bring her property up to current building standards while making sure her HVAC system keeps the comfort in the home and moisture and pests stay out.
Jonathan Gach runs a business called Building Science Detectives, which performs these energy audits, makes recommendations and performs upgrades or contracts with partners to make these fixes.
“A lot of people perceive windows and doors as a source of discomfort in their home when in reality, your windows and doors represent a relatively nominal percentage of your home’s total leakage,” he said.
In reality, he said it’s more often your floors and your ceilings. Gach walked Channel 9′s Michelle Alfini through a house to demonstrate an energy audit with the help of an infrared camera, he showed hot air leaking out of an improperly sealed attic.
“The attic access a lot of times is right next to the thermostat so you can imagine what kind of misinformation your thermostat might get next to a leaky, poorly insulated, hot attic access,” Gach said.
Sealing that access point and insulating the attic to keep all that hot air up there is key to keeping your air conditioning working properly in summer and preventing heat from escaping your home in the winter.
“Where we lack insulation in the home it’s like having a hole in the bucket,” he said.
It’s the same issue with walls. Homes built before the mid-1960s weren’t required to have insulation and therefore there’s little to no resistance keeping the air inside your house from getting outside.
Chris Canella with Blue Ridge Community Action said that’s one of the most common treatments older Charlotte homes get through the program.
“We basically wrapped a big thick warm blanket around the home,” he said.
According to Gach, that thermal blanket is what ensures your HVAC system can work properly, making it an even more important first step before replacing big appliances.
“When people are having a problem, unfortunately we tend to put money towards managing a symptom that only fixes the problem and gets us back to where we were,” he said.
“It’s best to figure out how you retain comfort in your home, before you make more of it,” he said. “It’s kind of like taking your car to the shop and you end up buying a new engine when you really just needed to fix the flat tire.”
Under the home, Gach said crawlspaces tend to be other massive drivers or energy waste and potential breeding grounds for mold and pests. He often recommends full crawlspace encapsulations to keep moisture out and reclaim the space for storage, appliances and ducts.
“You can see where your house and the way it works changes when you seal the top and the bottom,” he said. “They’re not necessarily things that improve the way your home looks, but the way it works.”
Unfortunately, the biggest upgrades also tend to be expensive. Installing insulation in the walls and attic can cost a few thousand on its own, encapsulating a crawlspace is somewhere around $10,000 and then if you need to replace a furnace or AC unit on top of that, a full weatherization upgrade or retrofit can run between $15,000-$20,000.
For homeowners like Williamson that qualify for the weatherization assistance program, there’s help. The funds weren’t able to cover every potential upgrade she needed, but it was enough to get her living in comfort again and she’s noticed an improvement in her power bills.
“It was a big air conditioner they got me,” she said. “And I thought, ‘Hoo God, I hope my electric bill won’t be too high,’ but it’s not. It’s not.”
For other homeowners, there’s federal tax credits available to offset the costs of an energy audit, weatherization work and new appliances.
Gach said his work typically results in a 10-30 percent reduction in power bills, but the biggest factor is resident behavior. With the right upgrades, and mindful use of energy efficient equipment, he said customers’ money will go furthest.
“These benefits are more spread out over time,” he said.
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