Building Envelope

Photo by Andreas Lechtape, courtesy NBK Architectural Terracotta

The building envelope, or building enclosure, protects us and the building interior from the elements and enables occupant comfort. The building envelope includes the cladding, air barrier, weather barrier, thermal insulation, and other components.

Building Envelope

Deep Dives

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  • Prefabricating Green: Building Environmentally Friendly Houses Off Site

    Feature

    Prefabricated housing offers several potential environmental benefits, including reduced transportation impacts, reduced waste, and quality control for better durability and performance. Aside from a few industry leaders, however, most manufacturers do not take full advantage of those efficiencies to create affordable high-performance houses.

  • Making Air Barriers that Work: Why and How to Tighten Up Buildings

    Feature

    Incorporating a continuous air barrier into a building's design and construction can save energy and improve the indoor environment, among other benefits. The right materials and assemblies can help accomplish that goal, but careful attention during design and close oversight during construction are essential.

  • Cost-Effective Green Retrofits: Opportunities for Savings in Existing Buildings

    Feature

    Between lighting, water use, mechanical systems, the building envelope, and occupant health, existing buildings are rife with cost-effective retrofits and operational opportunities that also offer environmental benefits. Improvements range from the painfully obvious to the more complex and involved.

  • Polystyrene Insulation: Does It Belong in a Green Building?

    Feature

    Polystyrene is widely used as a rigid insulation in North America, offering high insulation values, moisture resistance, strength, and affordability. But a flame retardant in the material, as well as its life-cycle impacts, raise questions about whether it should be used at all.

Quick Takes

Jump straight to the essentials with these short explanations of green building concepts.

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  • Reducing Heat Flow Through Windows

    Explainer

    Bringing daylight into a building through windows usually means a loss of heat; low-emissivity coatings, multiple panes, and gas fills can make windows more energy-efficient.

  • Thermal Bridging

    Explainer

    Thermal bridging, when one material conducts heat much better than materials around it, can reduce the effectiveness of insulation to a surprising extent.

  • How Insulation Works

    Explainer

    Understanding how insulation works can help us find the right material for a particular project.

  • How R-Value Is Calculated

    Explainer

    You know what R-value is, but how do they figure it out? And is it really a reliable measure of insulation performance?

Product Guidance

Unbiased information from our product experts helps you separate green from greenwash.

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  • Cardinal Introduces New LoE3 Glass

    Product Review

    The nation's largest manufacturer of low-emissivity glass for residential windows has introduced an improved triple-coated glass, now being used by several window makers.

  • Enertia Double-Envelope Home Still Has Problems

    Product Review

    Although its passive solar design is sound, the Enertia double-envelope home's energy performance claims may be overstated and its design presents fire risks.

  • Alpen Fiberglass Windows-Leading the High-Performance Race

    Product Review

    Alpen Energy Group manufacturers some of the highest-performing windows in the world, with center-of-glass R-values reaching R-20 in some cases.

  • A Low-Emissivity Coating That Really Works

    Product Review

    Despite manufacturer claims, not all insulating coatings are created equal. Coatings with ceramic particles are not effective, but coatings with metallic particles, like LO/MIT-II from SOLEC-Solar Energy Corporation, can reduce radiant heat transfer.

In The News

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Perspective

Thought-provoking opinions from the most trusted minds in sustainability.

Learning Resources

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