Tag Archives: airtight house costs

Why build an airtight house? – The Ampack 10 year Warranty

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Why build an airtight house?

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The Ampack Market leading 10 year warranty covers the cost of removal of all affected material, as well as the replacement of all damaged materials.

10 reasons for an airtight House

  1. In the case of new buildings a permanent, airtight layer is now essentially a requirement.
  2. New building regulations ensure that the assigned certifier must have correct detailing to avoid future construction damage
  3. No draughts
  4. Lower heating costs
  5. No condensation in the construction
  6. No mould formation
  7. No damage to the building
  8. Clear improvement in the quality of air in the rooms
  9. Clear improvement in sound insulation
  10. Ventilation systems work highly efficiently

Ampack only

These days, homeowners and clients expect more in terms of quality in their  homes. In particular, they pay special attention to their climate: It has to be comfortable, It should not damp or too dry and the energy costs must be kept within reason. In other words: Everything should be right, with no ifs or buts. Which is one more reason why the construction of new buildings should always be airtight.

Build well, build airtight

Heat loss due to a lack of airtightness is extremely expensive and can potentially cause great damage. The installation of a high quality airtight layer protects both your wallet and the value of the building. The amortisation of the investment over many years is clearly more relevant here than the short-term cost considerations.

Even the smallest joints and tears in the building shell can cause disastrous amounts of damage to a house and result in clearly escalating energy costs.

Construction Damage

Thermography: Blue = heat loss resulting from ventilation = increase in energy consumption and structural damage.

Thermography: Blue = heat loss
resulting from ventilation = increase
in energy consumption and structural
damage.

Mould formation within a multi-layer structural component.

Mould formation within a multi-layer
structural component.

 

Partel are the exclusive Irish and UK agent for the Ampack range of airtightness, wind-tightness, and building protection products. Ampack was founded in 1946 and is one of Europes most established specialist membrane and tape manufacturers.

“Our Ampack products offer a complete building protection system, from radon membranes to airtight membranes, tapes, adhesives, and wind-tight membranes, and Ampack’s unique 10 year guarantee ensures customers confidence in our range” .

 

 

 

Achieving airtightness for the new building regulations. 

At Partel we have worked on a standardisation of robust airtight details designed to ensure the following: -

  1. Compliance with building regulations
  2. Quality detailing to achieve excellent blower door results

Our details when applied correctly will always exceed the current building regulations and achieve lower than 0.6 air changes – the passive house standard

All of construction drawings are  available for free download at the links below

Auto cad drawings available on request – contact us here 

 

Airtightness and MVHR – What is the real cost/saving?

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Passive Airtightness & MVHR V Building regulations

During our recent passive house designer course with Target Zero we considered the following – a cost comparison of a typical house designed to meet current building regulations and a house designed to achieve passive house levels of Airtightness including MVHR.

The results  were surprising and had the potential to save €20,000 over the life of the mortgage

  • €643/year = Cost of air leakage at 7/m3/m2/h – Current building regulations (N 50 of 5.74) Losses due to leakage  and through required vents as per Part F
  • €96/year = Cost of air leakage at 0.6ac/h -Certified Passive house, Passive House has losses due to MVHR efficiency – losses based on 85% efficiency.
  • €547 = Annual difference in cost of air leakage between passive house levels and achieving building regulations

Payback timeframe for MVHR and Airtightness

In order to consider the payback periods we will look at the supply and fit cost of Ampack Airtight materials and a supply and fit price for a Lunos MVHR

Total cost of €8000 for Airtightness measures and mechanical ventilation

Calculation of savings on a simple basis using annuity factor method over 30 years works out as: -

0.03/(1-(1+.03)-30 *€8000 => 4080 => Additional loan repayment cost per annum = €408

Additional annual saving from efficiency of Lunos MVHR system above centralised MVHR estimated at €100 pa (Each fan costs approximately €5.00 per annum)

A building built to building regulations natural ventilation will have €548 more costs than a passive house just due to leakage. It will cost you €408 per year on loan repayment – so you still have a savings of €140.

  • €140.00 Annual saving from the above example.
  • €100.00 Additional saving by using Lunos MVHR ventilation system
  • €240.00 Total potential savings per annum from installing the above systems.

If we invested the €240.00 over the life of the mortgage we could save €8640 and earn interest of €11,417 to give total savings of approximately €20,000 over 30 years

On top of the savings the occupants of the house will have the following benefits: -

  • Condensation is avoided in the structure
  • The formation of mould and structural damage is avoided
  • Pollutants are avoided in the air within the rooms
  • The noise-reduction mass in structural components is guaranteed
  • The insulating effect of structural components is guaranteed
  • The ability of ventilation systems to work properly is guaranteed

Much of the detailed analysis and workings that resulted in the figures can be found here (www.targetzero.ie) but a standard 2 story house with a square footage of 200m2 was assumed. We also assumed an annual energy usage of €110 for a centralised system, a 30 year mortgage, typical masonry construction, identical insulation and building fabric for each house. 

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