Author: Matthew Cutler-Welsh
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How to have a warm home and no power bills in Christchurch
Chris McKay and his family were forced to leave their home in Christchurch after the Canterbury earthquakes in 2011. Like many others, they were faced with the task of finding a new home and they chose to start from scratch and to build. Early on the process, they decided they wanted to have a warm…
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Improving Home Performance with Curtains
How important are curtains when it comes to improving the performance of your home? Curtains and Curtain Tracks As Chad Keven from Heavy Duty Curtains explains, it’s not just about the drapes, the curtain track that supports the curtain can also play a big role in improving the insulation properties. The alternative to a track…
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Home is Where the Heart is
Home is where the heart is. It’s also where our lungs are, where our eyes and ears are, where our whole bodies, and where our minds are. The home is where we are, for 70-90% of the time. Think about that. The average person spends about three quarters of their day, in their house. The…
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Simple LCA to Measure the Impact of Where Stuff Comes From
How do you measure the impact of where stuff comes from, and why is this important? Life Cycle Analysis Measuring the overall impact of stuff is the objective of life cycle analysis, or LCA. The type of impacts considered in LCA include: Where the raw materials come from How far they have to travel The…
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Affordable Housing Policy
I just listened to a podcast recording of a very interesting interview; Kathryn Ryan from Nine to Noon speaking with David Preston, a consulting economist about public policy and affordable housing. David is also the author of one of the chapters in the new book Homes People Can Afford. Check out my interview (Home Style…
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Homes People Can Afford
We are not building enough homes people can afford. This was the focus of a workshop organised by He Kainga Oranga – The Housing and Health Research Programme, from the University of Otago in mid 2012. Since then, Sarah Bierre, Professsor Philippa Howden-Chapman and Lisa Early have been busy compiling written contributions from a number of…
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How to make your home solar-ready
This week I was thrilled to be asked some great questions by a subscriber and listener. Among these was a query about how to make your home solar-ready if you can’t afford to install solar straight away. The first premise of this question is one of affordability. It’s not the purpose of this post to…
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Using Design Navigator to Calculate R-Value and Check for Code Compliance
When creating a building design, how do you calculate the R-Value of building elements and check the design for code compliance? As Albrecht Stoecklein, creator of Design Navigator describes, getting this right in construction design can be tricky. Albrecht Stoecklein is a building physicist and has an Energy Management Diploma as well as vast experience…
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What’s a Building Whisperer?
What’s a ‘Building Whisperer’ and what do they have to do with making better homes? This is something I wanted to find out when I got the opportunity to talk with David Bartlett, Vice President IBM Smarter Buildings. David Bartlett is passionate not just about making buildings better in their own right, but improving how…
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ZETA Design + Build Modular Homes
ZETA Design + Build produce modular homes and buildings inside a factory. A great video on their website is probably the best way to see just how they’re revolutionising the manufacturing process of buildings and building modules. Howard Koenig, Chief Executive Officer ZETA Design + Build It’s telling that Howard Koenig, CEO of ZETA Design…