We recently were able to be a part of a fun project for Clark Companies, working on the field renovation at Whittier Field, Bowdoin College. It came down to a super tight deadline, weather and work hour restrictions and the transporting of an oversized load (not typical factors for us). To eliminate the last two hurdles, we rented an airplane hanger on the old Navy base (very cool). After 400 man hours in 5 days we were able to complete 99% of our scope (remainder needed to be completed with the building in place) and get the press box across Brunswick and onto its perch. Thanks to my guys and Swell Construction for putting in the long hours and making this happen.  

Hello everyone! I've spent a lot of time thinking about the perfect thermal envelope. And when I say perfect, I'm not referring to the most energy efficient. For all you mathy folk out there, I'm talking about an optimization problem with my two variables being cost and energy efficiency. I want to achieve the best bang-for-your-buck envelope without breaking the bank or falling short of R-values or thermal breaks. I was recently drawing up a detail that I've used on a Net-Zero ready home that I thought was in the realm of meeting this optimization. So, I thought I would share. I know there are a lot of articles out there on "the best way to insulate" or "the perfect thermal foundation," but none of them seem to tie that together, as nicely as I would like, with building the most affordable Net-Zero home possible. I've included a high-res PDF in case the photo is a little grainy. Feel free to comment with questions or suggestions for improvement. Thanks for reading!

Check out this video one of our great clients put together. It's a very cool time-lapse of a recent deck project he had us do. It was our first experience with the new PAMFast auto-feed system from the guys over at FastenMaster as well and it worked amazingly.  Enjoy!

So our first Net-Zero ready home is wrapping up on-schedule and on-budget. It's been a lot of fun applying modern green building techniques. We hope to raise awareness about these cost-effective and affordable homes that require very little energy to run. This particular house would cost the occupants $0 in heat, hot water, and electricity with only a 6Kw solar package. We've been keeping it at 70 degrees for the past few weeks (even when the windows were only taped plastic) with a very small, single room, electric heater. We'll be sure to post a complete entry about our process and our goals with these homes when the project is complete. For now, check out the short video below documenting the construction of the home (TIP: You may need to download it first for a smooth viewing). Thanks for visiting!

I recently had the opportunity to work with an associate of mine (Jamie Olsen - Northeast Insulation) on aspects of the insulating on the home in this article. The article is great and it really speaks to our mission here at N-E Construction. Net-Zero homes are certainly going to be the standard in the next 10 years. Using advanced building techniques and efficient materials, we can construct a turn key, Net-Zero home for under $200k. Kudos to Bob Howe for his ambition and vision on tackling projects like this. These homes are within reach for the average American family, not just those with $400k and above budgets. Tom Fullam has a great quote in this article about efficient building. "“I consider not building this way voluntary ignorance.” Feel free to comment or contact me anytime with questions about our Net-Zero home packages. 

Welcome and thanks for visiting our blog. The purpose of this blog is to share products we like and techniques we find most effective. We also like to keep our clients informed with articles and write-ups that we've found interesting or useful. Enjoy and be sure to check back in for updates!