The importance of Air tightness!

[TheMitchells]

Found this in a guide, "Sustainable Renovation.  A guide to improving homes for energy, health and environment."   

 

... airtightness is important is because it is usually the most cost effective way we have to reduce energy consumption. The difference between the construction costs of creating a leaky and an airtight one
is perhaps no more than 1%, yet it could mean a 40% improvement in performance. For those looking for “quick wins” there simply isn’t a more cost-effective solution.

 

Taken as an isolated item, the proportion of heat loss in a typical building due to draughts is very roughly 40%. This means that for every £100 spent on heating bills, £40 is due to air leakage. Also, as buildings
are responsible for around half of all UK carbon emissions, and that draughts are responsible for nearly half of that amount, then draughts are responsible for nearly a quarter of all UK carbon emissions, comparable to all carbon emissions associated with transport, that is, all car, bus, and train journeys, every year. So while airtightness can feel like a rather mundane subject, it is also extremely important.

 

While I am sure everyone on this site already knows this; to see it so clearly laid out how important it is, I thought it worth mentioning.

https://s3-eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/s3.spanglefish.com/s/31974/documents/[digitalv3]-guide-to-domestic-retrofit-compressed.pdf  150 page of good stuff which I am slowly workingmy way through.

 What I particularly like about the report is the important of the health of occupiers and how that goes hand in hand with a reduction in energy use while considering the environment too.