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Feature from Environmental Building News
June 1, 2008
Making Air Barriers that Work:
Why and How to Tighten Up Buildings
An Executive Summary is available for this article.
Air leaks may not be as dramatic as water leaks, but they cause plenty of problems. When a new LEED-certified building in New York formed icicles and ice dams, the owners brought in building-science consultant Terry Brennan of Camroden Associates to investigate. “The detailing of the air barrier was actually pretty good,” he says. The rafters are sealed with rigid-foam insulation taped at the seams, and the walls are sealed with gypsum board and a polyethylene vapor barrier. “But where they came together there was nothing in the drawings and nothing in the specs,” he told EBN, “so it’s got this crack.” With an eighth-inch (3-mm) crack running along the eaves, that gap leaks a lot of heated air, melting snow and causing ice buildup while creating the potential for leaks and moisture damage....
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