Research Page

News Flash
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Hurricane Insurance hard to get in BROOKLYN! WOW! Read here This home is more important than ever now.


The research begins. This page will be update frequently as I locate important reference materials.

Florida Building Code
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Florida has done an outstanding job putting the building code on the Internet. The 2004 code is here. I am using the search features to locate hurricane issues.

Now I am going to go looking for items that are particular to the Hurricane/Bug/Mildew proof dream home:

My first stop was looking for approved building materials. I already knew of AAC (autoclaved aerated concrete) but wasn't sure what the code said. Well it is approved.

Residential High Velocity Wind Construction is section 44 of the code. Not a lot here for the non-engineer.

And you have to love this page which shows termite infestation , sever wind and concrete weathering probabilities for the US. Now that is what I'm talking about! Now if they showed mold & mildew health statistics it would be the final vote for my criteria.

FEMA - Design and Construction Guidance for Community Shelters
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I'll review this later


AAC (autoclaved aerated concrete)
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I like the sound of AAC so far. You would think that a business with about 20 products (shapes) in its inventory would make it a bit friendlier to buy a house made of it. I first saw this on the Discovery Channel and the program had just about every major component I wanted to incorporate into the Dream Home. AAC was one of the items that caught my eye.

The Aerocon site has some good reference materials but I really want a "house in a box". I Googled for a long time and couldn't come up with any AAC predesigned homes. I want to see a home with a price. As soon as I start thinking of hiring an Engineer and Architect I start seeing dollars fly by. Also I still don't know what type of hurricane rating AAC will produce. There was one reference of $12/sqft exteriors and $8/sq ft interior wall. But there was nothing about floors and roofs. So a 2400 sq ft house would be 40wx60dx10h yields 2000 sq ft of exterior wall or $24,000 for the exterior walls. I read in Chicago concrete block was $8/sq ft so there is a big difference in price.

Integrated Concrete Form (ICF) Construction:
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I read much about this but I to date I am not that excited about ICF. I haven't ruled it out yet. This site has some reference materials that I found interesting. The one concern I have is the ability to get rebar in the walls to withstand 250 mph winds and debis.

Concrete Cast in place
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The fact that the hurricane shelter design calls for cast in place concrete I think this method will win out over AAC. I just found out concrete block is $2.50/block materials & labor. For a 60x40x10h one story 2400 sqft shell it would use about 2250 blocks or $5625 (window and door openings not subtracted). I do not know the cost of labor for cast in place but a 6 inch wall would be 37 cubic yards at $100/yd^3 is $3700 for materials alone. Even if I tripled the material cost to account for placement it would only be $11,100 or an additional $5475. Big Woop! With hurricane insurance well over $1000/yr this it only takes 5 years to break even! I am trying to refine these numbers as we speak.

37 cubic yards is about 5 truck loads, so it will be a busy day when it is time to pour. Actually it will be much more since the floor will also be poured that day. I just wanted to see the block vs cast in place numbers.

Geothermal HVAC
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Unfortunately my brother's house caught fire and now he is rebuilding. Fortunately he has found some great items for this blog. "Information for Evaluating Geoexchange Applications" prepared for New York State Energy and Research Development Authority. Although it is mostly about buildings larger than a typical house it is easy reading and very informative.

Most of my reading reveals claims of 25% - 70% reduction in operating expense. I have seen numbers of $2500 per ton. In the New York State document listed above I have seen 1800-2500 sq ft homes sized at 4-6 tons making the cost $10,000 - $15,000 for the system. OUCH! But then oil is holding at $62/bbl so go figure... really! goooo figure! Get out that calculator! Shooting down the middle, 50% savings; 5 tons, at $2500 per ton means that 5 years savings = $12,500 or $2500 per year. So you must be spending $5000./year on HVAC. Now if you are starting from scratch (new house or existing system MUST be replaced) it gets a bit better. We will use the factor that geothermal is 2x the price of a standard system so now you only need to recoup $6250 in 5 years or $1250.yr. That yields that a standard system would cast $2500/yr for HVAC. My family of 4 easily did this when we lived in Connecticut so that looks like a no-brainer to me!

So far the most "engineered" geothermal system I have found is from EarthLinked . I can't say I would recommend it since this is just the early stages of research but it does look cool :)

EnergyStar is a government resource and in some sense not very informative, however the pages have links to other sites that are worth the time to read. I use google to search the site like this
geothermal site:energystar.gov which seems to work better than their search system.

GeoExchange.org .is cool. I especially like their page on incentives available! That is a great way to save money if you qualify. They have some estimates on savings but they appear to be a bit rosy compared to other resources but I am not qualified to judge yet. I will be though!

Geothermal Manufactures:
Water Furnace - gotta love that name! To bad they seem to only be in Canada. A!
Climatemaster
EarthLinked
Radiantmax
TerraLink

Suppliers and Contractors:
Contractor locator
Allient Energy

So far my thoughts on geothermal are:
- It's worth the extra up-front expense
- A vertical system here in Florida should work fine. Easy to drill and lots of water under the ground.
- It will have an integrated water heating system
- I like the "green" factor.
- It's mature enough to trust.
- I wish it was easier to buy. One manufacturer with a list of contractors to get bids from. I want "Geothermal In A Box".

More geothermal facts and papers:

Geothermal hat Pumps == Trend and Comparisons
3 gal water per minute per ton of Heat pump capacity
Typical residence is 3 tons

International Ground Source Heat Pump Association (IGSHPA)
For standing column wells 80-120 ft water per ton AC

Solar Hot Water Heater
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I just discovered the blog where a team built a homemade solar water heater for under $4. They produced constant flow 110 degree water, and were able to obtain 170 degrees by letting the water sit in the solar heater for some time. All this on a 76 degree day!! BRAVO! Click to read the story .

Sterling Engine
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An amazing engine design that can work even with slight tempature differentials. Dean Kamen the inventory of the Segway has redeveloped this engine for use in underdeveloped countries. I wander ... could I use it in Orlando Florida? I'm thinking if I can combine Solar hot water with Geothermal cold water can I run the house? Now that's what I'm talk'n bout!

Here is Dean's site with info on the sterling engine. And here is one of the bet explainations of how they work complete with colorful animations.