North American Insulation Manufacturers Association (NAIMA) recently announced the result of its annual recycled content survey, which reports its members' use of recycled materials. In 2022, NAIMA members in the United States and Canada used more than 3.4 billion pounds of recycled glass and slag in the production of residential, commercial,...

How long would your home remain comfortable and habitable in the event of a power outage in this summer’s brutal heat? The answer might depend on how well insulated your home is, according to a new report released by the U.S. Department of Energy. Analysis from the report, Enhancing Resilience in Buildings Through Energy Efficiency, finds that...

A new report just published by the American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy (ACEEE) highlights that pairing residential heat pump heating and cooling systems with air sealing and insulation will reduce likely increases in customer costs and strain on the electric grid. The report’s message is timely as states prepare to implement two key...

Heat pump technology is all the rage in the push for electrification and increased home energy efficiency, and with good reason: heat pumps are more efficient than electric resistance heating, reducing electricity needed for heating by up to 50 percent. However, there are several actions that homeowners should take before adding a heat pump so...

NAIMA has just released a new guide covering the most frequent questions raised by insulation contractors and others in the building industry about the 25C Energy Efficiency Home Improvement Credit. The four-page guide clarifies various elements of the credit, including:

If you follow building energy efficiency code development and implementation at all, then you know that builders in North Carolina oppose efforts to modernize the state’s outdated energy efficiency code. That code is largely unchanged from the 2009 IECC, and the North Carolina Home Builders Association is fighting to keep it that way.

Newly released fire and smoke-developed testing for fiberglass and elastomeric duct liner products raises serious concerns about the performance of elastomeric duct liner in those aspects. “Fire Performance of Duct Liners: A Product Comparison Study” details testing conducted by Intertek Labs on elastomeric and fiberglass duct liner products...

The White House today announced a proposal that new homes purchased using Federal Housing Administration (FHA) or U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) mortgages must be built to the standards of the 2021 International Energy Conservation Code (IECC). Current FHA/USDA mortgage standards require compliance with the 2009 IECC. This proposed standard...

The National Association of Realtors (NAR) has just released its 2023 REALTORS and Sustainability Report – Residentialwhich shows that the majority of these real estate professionals (63 percent) find promoting a home's energy efficiency very or somewhat valuable. More than 2,000 realtors participated in the survey, and their opinions of energy...