Everywhere We've Been Seen In:

January 2018

Jigar Shah Home Comfort Book Shout Out on Energy Gang Podcast. 5 January 2018. Jigar got his copy and calls it a great read and Nate an "extraordinary guy". Stephen mentions Nate and how he turned him on to how effective deeper retrofits can be as well as how little accountability there is in the energy efficiency program space. If you like learning about renewables and the grid, this is a great podcast to learn with.

Jigar Shah and Stephen Lacey Give Back-to-Back Shout Out on The Energy Gang Podcast.  19 January 2018. This episode is a fascinating one about electric airplanes. At 42:40 Jigar Shah mentions Nate's tweets about running a heat pump through the Christmas - New Year's cold snap. Jigar sees that air source heat pumps are a viable path. Stephen got his copy of The Home Comfort Book just as he bought his first home. 

5 Priorities for Creating Comfortable, Efficient Homes. Healthy Indoors Magazine January 2018. Making a home comfortable and efficient always follows the same basic path. 

December 2017

Best Indoor Air Quality Monitors. Healthy Indoors Magazine December 2017. Nate compares 7 different IAQ monitors and applies a usefulness and effectiveness framework to each one. One comes out on top. 

November 2017

HVAC School Podcast with Bryan Orr: Removing Gas Meters and Cold Climate Heat Pumps. Bryan and Nate met in October, he runs a medium large HVAC company near Orlando FL. He thought it was wild we are making heat pumps work in a cold climate, so he had Nate on. Stitcher link. iTunes link episode 11/17/17.

October 2017

House Whisperer Column Debut - Healthy Indoors Magazine October 2017.  Bob Krell was kind enough to offer a column in Healthy Indoors Magazine.

September 2017

Building HVAC Science Podcast with Bill Spohn - IAQ and Humidity. Bill owns TruTech Tools which distributes HVAC testing tools. He also happens to be ravenously curious and also very generous with his time and knowledge. This interview talks about how critical controlling humidity is to the health and longevity of a building. Stitcher.  iTunes 9/20/17.

May 2017

The Most Sustainable Ways to Heat and Cool Your Home - Ohio State University Green Home Workshop 16 May 2017 - Nate presented on the different types of heat pumps and how they can be an excellent replacement for furnaces even in cold climates using real homes and real usage. 

Residential Lighting: How to Determine the Most Energy Efficient Technology for Your Needs - Ohio State University Green Home Workshop 16 May 2017 - How to buy an efficient light bulb you actually like. Presentation was adapted from the Lighting Chapter. 

Creating Healthy Homes for Our Kids - Department of Energy National Tribal Energy Summit 2017, Washington DC - Nate presented about a case study helping out a mold sensitive client and how that could be applicable to tribes who often have high childhood asthma rates.

How a 117 Year Old Home Became the Future of Sustainable Housing - Chris Orris - Foobot Indoor Air Quality Monitors - A different look at the 1900 House of the Future case study. 

January 2017

How Builders Can Win Using Energy Use Data - Stacy Fitzgerald-Redd - Insulation Institute Blog - Transparent energy use is likely to become a driver of home value. An interview with Ted Kidd and Nate Adams.

October 2016

Winterizing Your Home - Michael Peters - Shaker Life Magazine - Three experts were inteviewed about winterizing homes. Nate Adams responds about reducing ice damming and icicles.

August 2016

Energy Efficient Homes Are Worth More. So Let's Create an Easy Metric for Buyers. - GreenTech Media republished an article about Energy Use Intensity, or EUI, that is like MPG for homes.

July 2016

Which Home Indoor Air Quality Monitors Are Best, And Why? - CleanTechnica republished my review of a number of new IAQ monitors including Foobot, NetAtMo, Hobo MX1101, Awair, and Air Mentor 6 in 1. Bottom line - only one is good enough so far.

June 2016

IAQ & Energy Instruments and Monitors - Bill Spohn and Nate Adams - Indoor Air Quality Radio - Talking about new Indoor Air Quality monitors and the instruments needed for professionals with Bill Spohn, who literally invented a number of test instruments.

May 2016

Getting Aggressive: Delivering Better Comfort with Load Matching, Aggressively Sized HVAC Equipment - Presentation to the Cleveland Chapter of Air Conditioner Contractors Association (ACCA) 5/12/16.

April 2016

Habitat House Part 1: Priniciples, Budget, and Priorities - Journal of Light Construction Online - Republished the series on the Habitat for Humanity project.

Habitat House Part 2: The Energy Audit - Looking at the condition of the home to figure out what needs to be done.

Is Home Performance Still In High Demand? - ACHR News

December 2015

How to Really Improve Energy Efficiency and Comfort - Cameron Taylor's article was republished at CleanTechnica.

November 2015

The Little Old House With Amazing Comfort - My friend and HVAC expert Cameron Taylor visited my favorite project, a home that has been converted to be all electric.

Department of Energy Better Buildings Webinar - Driving Accountability for Program Performance Using Measured Energy Savings (201) - I presented on one of our projects. I was the only contractor on the call. Here are the slides.

October 2015

What We Learned at the 2015 Healthy Buildings Summit - IAQ Radio - Reviewing what we learned at an Indoor Air Quality conference. (Not a command performance on my part, frankly.) A great podcast to know about, though.

September 2015

We're Doing Residential Energy Efficiency All Wrong - GreenTech Media - My article calling out my industry for focusing on the wrong things, like selling efficiency, rather than solving consumer problems and building trust with them.

August 2015

Is Energy Efficiency Broken? - Shelton Group Newsletter - Suzanne Shelton of the Shelton Group, which specializes in marketing Energy Efficiency to utilities and other large corporations. This article discusses a recent study about the cost effectiveness of low income weatherization programs, and how focusing on only one thing (energy savings) leads to myopic conclusions.

Is Energy Efficiency Cost Effective? - Builder Magazine - The 'Is Energy Efficiency Article' above is republished in Builder Magazine, the magazine for the National Associate of Home Builders.

July 2015

Home Performance Coalition's Newsletter - Interview on industry direction and how we need to focus on homeowner wants and needs while measuring results and proving that what we do works.

New Devices for Indoor Air Quality May Provide a Catalyst for Residential Energy Efficiency - Green Tech Media - I'm excited about the new IAQ devices hitting the market, they allow consumers to see what is going on in their home, no guessing. This will likely drive projects.

June 2015

IAQ Radio Interview - This is a great podcast, I listen to it a lot, then was invited to be on. The first half is about efficiency programs, the second half is about how Home Performance affects indoor air quality. Also check out episodes from Joe Lstiburek, Bill Rose, Lew Harriman, Richard Rue and Richard Corsi.

Lies, Damned Lies, and Modeling: Energy Efficiency's Problem with Tracking Savings - GreenTech Media - We get mentioned for our efforts to make efficiency programs more efficient by paying for what they want - energy savings. Check out GreenTech's Energy Gang podcast as well, they have a great wide lens perspective on where we're going.

May 2015

ACI 2015 New Orleans, LA - The Affordable Comfort conference is the largest conference for the Home Performance industry. Nate will be speaking on using energy modeling to develop larger, more effectual projects.

February 2015

Icicles and Ice Dams Can Damage Your Home; Here's How to Cope During the Deep Freeze - Cleveland Plain Dealer - A brief summary of our ice dam page.

Measured Results Are Coming to Energy Efficiency Programs. Are You Ready? - Energy Efficiency Markets - A piece on the myriad ways big data is about to rock the Home Performance world and out its lack of performance.

Why Low Hanging Fruit Has Poisoned Energy Efficiency - GreenTech Media - Republished from our blog.

January 2015

One Knob On The Energy Gang Podcast - Jigar Shah, Katherine Hamilton, and Stephen Lacey discuss the One Knob program design proposal - very favorably. Go to 22:00 for the discussion.

Building Performance Podcast - Corbett Lunsford learns how I'm turning Energy Smart to be results focused, and away from chasing rebates.

November 2014

How Small Jobs Killed My Business - Journal of Light Construction - JLC picked up the articles about how program design creates a structure no small business can thrive under.

The TREE House Takes Root - The Weekly Villager - Cutting the ribbon on the TREE House Deep Energy Retrofit project. Nate gets called a guru in this one thanks to Debbie Kasper, the faculty member in charge of the project.

Details of the One Knob Program Proposal - One Knob Part 4 - Green Building Advisor

October 2014

Hard Truths of Home Performance - One Knob Part 3 - Green Building Advisor - Lots of uncomfortable things need to be acknowledged about our industry or things will never move forward.

The 'Low Hanging Fruit' Fallacy - One Knob Part 2 - Green Building Advisor - There are no silver bullets, it takes whole home thinking to affect real change in client homes.

Designing an Efficiency Program That Works - One Knob Part 1 - Green Building Advisor - Current program designs do not focus on results, have no accountability, and have failed to affect market transformation. That needs to change.

September 2014

An Efficiency Manifesto: Energy and Home Performance Programs Need Serious Reform - GreenTech Media (an abridged version of How a Program Killed My Business and the One Knob Series)

How an Efficiency Program Killed My Business - Green Building Advisor - The design of a program created a structure that no business can thrive under, and Energy Smart is far from alone.

Your Education Will Not Be Televised - Debbie Kasper of Hiram College - Humorously describes the wacky process of doing a Deep Energy Retrfit on the TREE House, which is the new home of the Environmental Studies Department at Hiram College.

August 2014

More Than Tips Needed to Save Energy - Journal of Light Construction - NOTE: Pay wall on this article. It describes a more thorough process to designing solutions that actually work, not just prescribing things and hoping for results.

July 2014

Why Energy Saving Tips Suck - Journal of Light Construction - Check out the comments on this one.

How One Guy Sells Home Performance - Habitat X - Chris Dorsi is the founder of the Habitat X conference and is the author of the industry textbook Residential Energy.

Insulation and Air Sealing at the TREE House - Debbie Kasper of Hiram College - A description of the project and a rare shot of Nate manning a blow hose.

May 2014

Another Report on the Great Ventilation Debate - Green Building Advisor - How much ventilation a home needs to keep indoor air fresh has turned into a big brouhaha in the Home Performance industry. This was a 5 on 1 fight and the 1 won.

April 2014

Presenter at ACI National - The Home Performance Industry Conference - Nate presented on marketing with Peter Troast of Energy Circle, the industry's guru, and also was part of a panel about programs and contractors.

Hiram College Earth Day Celebration - Nate Adams presented on Myths and Realities of Insulation and Home Performance.

March 2013

Hiram College TREE House Project Begins - A deep energy retrofit with the goal of reducing the energy use of a 1901 house by 75% or more. The house will become the home for the Enviromental Studies Program at Hiram College. It's a rocky path...

January 2013

What Causes Icicles and Ice Dams - Energy Vanguard - Allison Bailes of Energy Vanguard is the premier blogger in the Home Performance space, he picked up Nate's articles about icicles, and is also a friend.