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"Gas Armageddon": Energy/electricity prices in EU/UK (and how to deal with them)
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tszaboo:

--- Quote from: madires on September 01, 2022, 01:52:14 pm ---
--- Quote from: tszaboo on September 01, 2022, 01:25:09 pm ---Might be a fluke in the Dutch knowledge, like that other misinformation, you can only use heatpumps if your house is well isolated.

--- End quote ---

You can heat your non-insulated home also with heat pumps, but you'll waste a lot of electric power. It's the same for any other energy source. Despite this forum being about electronics some people think that electric power simply comes out of the wall socket. Here's a question for you: how does that power get into the wall socket?

--- End quote ---
I have a guy who fills it up with a bucket of electricity every few months.


--- Quote from: nctnico on September 01, 2022, 11:51:33 am ---Those bricks are intended for inner walls only! You can't use these for outside walls, read the datasheet. Last year I have looked into these bricks as a light weight solution to upgrade my shed but the specs say these aren't suitable for outside walls.

--- End quote ---
The plot thickens, because the same company I linked sells bricks here. And you don't have the same series available here, only the old school solid bricks. I'm starting to feel there is a building code which forces us here to build poorly isolated houses, stuck with centuries old technology.
Siwastaja:

--- Quote from: tszaboo on September 01, 2022, 11:28:41 am ---I've seen moisture issues, usually near bathrooms, that is easily solved with ventilation.

--- End quote ---

With bathrooms, there is no excuse not to do them properly.

This is, bathrooms just absolutely need seamless vapor barriers inside. When you do that, no humidity enters the structures, so any moisture remains a surface problem, which is easily revealed. That surface moisture is indeed solved with enough ventilation (and/or, dehumidifiers).

Whenever the bathroom leaks humid air into the structures, it's Game Over for the structures. Of course even then ventilation helps to reduce the issue, but it's a slippery slope. The point is, it is not fruitful to discuss if adding extra insulation on the outside makes already bad situation possibly a tiny bit worse.

Good thing about adding vapor-passing insulation (such as mineral wool, then air barrier, then a ventilation gap, then outer surface) on the outside is, it rarely makes anything worse. Even if the original structures have problems, they will be at higher temperatures after the retrofit, and spend less time with dew point inside. Optimally though, original vapor barriers should be fixed / new vapor barriers added, but that is not always an option due to cost of renovating everything.

It is also worth remembering that if the original structure has ever had problems, the mold inside keeps spewing toxins even if the dewing conditions are removed, for decades. Damaged materials should always be replaced.

Vapor tight materials on the outside are a huge risk, of course.
Marco:

--- Quote from: Zero999 on August 31, 2022, 08:20:53 pm ---Our so-called Conservative government is going to ban petrol cars in 2030. Less than 8 years from now.

--- End quote ---

2050 is net zero date, mean lifetime of passenger cars is around 20 years. You think the peons have it bad, wait till you start to hear professionals screaming when government finally stops listening them and finalizes the date for the SF6 ban, pros are also pros at coming up with excuses. It will be an endless litany, which can only be overcome by ignoring it and using governments monopoly on violence to make them.
Marco:

--- Quote from: Siwastaja on September 01, 2022, 08:16:21 am ---I'm wondering how well this works

--- End quote ---

As long as the wall can't rot, concrete or brick, what does exterior insulation matter? Any liquid water will accumulate at the outside of the original wall and just follow gravity, same as the rain which would have hit it. It's more a question of drainage.
Siwastaja:

--- Quote from: Marco on September 01, 2022, 03:51:57 pm ---As long as the wall can't rot, concrete or brick
--- End quote ---

I don't think this classical assumption is safe to do. After all, we do have a real indoor air quality epidemic here in public buildings, especially schools built starting from 1970's. These are all concrete and brick. No one has been able to find conclusive evidence what exactly is wrong, but clearly some very nasty microbes can live in concrete or brick, even if the amount of organic material for them to consume is orders of magnitude smaller than in wood structures. Chemical emissions from plastic flooring materials, released by chemical reactions triggered by moisture (not present during qualification testing of the materials) is also suspected.



--- Quote ---Any liquid water will accumulate at the outside of the original wall and just follow gravity, same as the rain which would have hit it. It's more a question of drainage.

--- End quote ---

Yes, with enough insulation added, the dew point could potentially move out of the original wall, into the new insulation, and it could theoretically be built with insulation materials designed to drain any condensate, like the Swedish innovation Isodrän (which is designed to be used in underground walls, but the same idea). Plain old mineral wool holds the water in tiny droplets and gravity can't do the job until the material is completely damp. So while possible, draining is not trivial. Best we can usually do is to minimize the amount of water getting into the structure, and then let whatever gets there anyway dry by evaporation. These goals are normally achieved by stopping water vapor from entering from the side which on average has more absolute humidity (i.e., indoors), and letting the structure pass any humidity on the side which on average has less absolute humidity (outside). Rain is best stopped, by far, with a simple physical gap (ventilation gap), the only downsides being requiring some space for that gap (maybe 2cm), and any outer layers after that gap not contributing to thermal insulation of the building.

In very hot and humid climates where cooling dominates over heating, these roles are of course swapped, as inside air is cool and dry, and if vapor barrier is used at all, it should be on the outside. But I don't know enough about how this is dealt with in such climates.
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