Healthy Homes, Smarter Systems: Wellness, IAQ, and the OASYS House Case Study

00:00:02:08 - 00:00:26:29
Mike Collignon: All right. Happy Wednesday everyone. Did you know today is global recycling day? It is. And I just wanted you to know that, I recycle all my word documents when I'm done using them. It's spring. That means allergy season for some people. But luckily, today's webinar is all about wellness, indoor air quality, and the Oasis House case study.

00:00:27:01 - 00:00:51:14
Mike Collignon: What is the Oasis House? You ask why? It's Panasonic's Oasis concept home, which is a real world case study. It's going to allow Panasonic, and by extension, all of us here, to explore how integrated whole home systems can improve indoor air quality, manage humidity, enhance comfort and create lasting value. Here to give a brief a brief presentation and then discuss the project further is Ken Nelson.

00:00:51:16 - 00:01:17:15
Mike Collignon: Ken is responsible for setting the vision and messaging for Panasonic's wholesale business, and developing the strategic initiatives that grow the company's market share among its valued distributor. Specification and contractor partners. With over 35 years of experience in wholesale distribution, including the past 14 years focused on ventilation and Hvac with Panasonic. Ken brings a deep understanding of the sales landscape for manufacturing to end user.

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Mike Collignon: Now he'll be joined by Curtis Lawson. Curtis is the principal and visionary of Crafted Custom Homes, a Houston based custom home builder and remodeling firm. He has led since 2004 with more than two decades in residential construction. Curtis is known for combining real world jobsite experience with a practical, systems driven approach to delivering high quality projects and better client outcomes.

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Mike Collignon: Now join us after their presentation to facilitate a group discussion is Sarah Gutterman, co-founder and CEO of Green Building Media. Sarah has established a reputation as a visionary, thought leader and passionate advocate for sustainability, and she works closely with a diverse group of stakeholders in the building industry, such as our guests here to develop impactful, long term green strategies that are simultaneously sustainable and profitable.

00:02:04:01 - 00:02:26:29
Mike Collignon: Now, our webinar is brought to you today by Panasonic Panasonic Healthy Indoor Living Solutions is helping builders across the country differentiate themselves with powerful, code compliant and cost effective indoor air quality solutions that provide a safer environment for homebuyers. During the course of the presentation and the discussion. You can submit questions for our panel. Simply use the Q&A function located in the menu bar at the bottom of the zoom window.

00:02:27:01 - 00:02:46:14
Mike Collignon: I'll review those questions and pose them to our guests after their discussion. All right, Ken, I'm going to go ahead and let you kick things off.

00:02:46:17 - 00:03:10:08
Ken Nelson: Okay. So. But I can hear you just fine, sir. Super. Thank you much. So to kick off the story, two things. One is excellent that you're recycling, as I'm from the Pacific Northwest where we grow a lot of paper products, paper trees. And so any time that you can recycle and reuse that, that's, it's a great boon for our forest industry.

00:03:10:11 - 00:03:41:28
Ken Nelson: And two, I think it's exciting that we're talking about indoor air here today, as I'm in San Antonio. And one of the challenges they're having just today is that the pollen counts are obnoxious here in San Antonio, all across Texas. That's a huge pollen time frame where indoor air quality is is really both problematic and fragile because of air pressure moving through the house, bringing moisture, bringing particulates and the occupants, struggling.

00:03:42:00 - 00:04:08:10
Ken Nelson: So the Oasis house, the concept of the Oasis house is that it's going to provide a safe space, an oasis, if you will, it, for each occupant. By that, I mean it's going to provide indoor air quality. It's going to provide comfortable, living environment, temperature controls, filtration. There's air purification in this particular application. It's essentially becomes a safe haven for for the occupants.

00:04:08:10 - 00:04:33:20
Ken Nelson: And this is what we this is what we kind of strive for. And this is what all builders should be striving for, right? One of the biggest, things that people look for in a home is they want to be safe and healthy. So, Mary, if you would advance the slide, let's talk about the Oasis project. So the Oasis project uses, a unique Hvac strategy.

00:04:33:23 - 00:04:54:04
Ken Nelson: I should say it's unique here in the United States. It's not so unique in Asia where we sell and or install a ton of the Oasis style, applications where in this particular case, what we're doing is we're using a singular air handler room, and then into that air handler room, the return air comes right into the room.

00:04:54:06 - 00:05:14:29
Ken Nelson: And then we distribute that air after it's tempered and it has a little Merv six filter to manage indoor dust and whatnot, and then it's again distributed throughout the house. We're using a couple of pretty dynamic features. We're using our our exhaust fans, air supply fans, which is an interesting and I'll tell you more about that in a minute.

00:05:15:02 - 00:05:49:23
Ken Nelson: But we're also using many splits for moisture management, for temperature control. And then we're using ERV for fresh air or ventilation applications. So if you could advance that slide real quick, one of the things you'll see here is how the air flows throughout our house. Right. We we distributed out of the air handler room. It pressurizes into the outdoor into the external spaces that pressurization actually drives, that return air back up into a larger space, which then goes into the air handler room where it's all conditioned and tempered and then redistributed.

00:05:49:26 - 00:06:15:07
Ken Nelson: The objective of that is that we're going to we're going to distribute air throughout that house about its technically it's 3.7 times, but about four times per hour. Every cubic foot of air in that house will cycle through that air handler room. So in in particular in the air handler room with our mini switch, we're also using our nano technology, which is a purification strategy within the Ductless heat pump.

00:06:15:07 - 00:06:32:06
Ken Nelson: It uses a hydroxyl radical to help manage viruses and bacteria. Live viruses live bacteria before it can be redistributed back out throughout the system. So if you can go to the next slide.

00:06:32:09 - 00:06:56:06
Ken Nelson: Show what it does for the house is it allows for continuous and and balanced temperature, humidity throughout the house. I've got a couple of slides here. These are a little dashboard snapshots that we use to to monitor the house itself. And on the left you'll see in this particular snapshot the outside was 30 degrees at 87% humidity.

00:06:56:08 - 00:07:25:19
Ken Nelson: But 12 micro, net nano 12 parts per million, if you will. So which is in kind of a high, 2.5 count, which is problematic outside. Right? That just means there's a lot of bad air outside as you look through the house where it comes into the house, through the ERV. And I'm sorry, my screen is really small, so it's going to come in to that house.

00:07:25:22 - 00:07:48:04
Ken Nelson: It looks like it's coming in around three parts per million into what we call that loft area. On the right hand side, you'll see an area, a dot that says loft. That loft area is coming in at three, 3.5, which is pretty remarkable. And that's the ERV, the Erb, the Merv 13 filter is filtering out the the particulates from outside before it allows it to come inside.

00:07:48:06 - 00:08:12:09
Ken Nelson: And, and that way we can provide a particulate pollen. In this case, there's a lot of, benzene. There's all sorts of stuff outside that comes in from from different spaces, including they're they're petroleum products that they manufacture outside of just, Houston and the, the Galveston area. So but you'll also see the room temperatures are all within 1 or 2 degrees.

00:08:12:14 - 00:08:37:13
Ken Nelson: So how we do that is we have direct power. Each fan has a direct path to that space that it's being distributed to. And some spaces you'll have more than one fan, for example, that living room has, I think, five fans. The dining room has one fan, the den has one fan. There's a master bedroom that has two fans, but all of these fans combined to move 100 cfm continuously.

00:08:37:20 - 00:09:01:00
Ken Nelson: So every cubic foot of space in that house gets just gets changed out about four times an hour. So if you could go to the next slide real quick that so that's a particular slide we just saw was a 30 degree outdoor. So here's an 85 degree outdoor 73%. And again you'll see that PM 2.5 outside is obnoxious.

00:09:01:03 - 00:09:21:24
Ken Nelson: But when you look throughout the house the temperature in the house is around 7374 degrees. What I would what I go to look for is where the, the air handler room is, and you'll see the air handler room is around 66 degrees, 58%. So that air handler room is where all the cooling is occurring. And then it's being distributed.

00:09:21:24 - 00:09:40:05
Ken Nelson: And this is at 123 in the afternoon. So this is the high part of the day, the hot part of the day. So we're actually able to manage that temperature to all the rooms and humidity. And we're going to go to the next slide which will show us got let's go ahead and move to the next slide real quick.

00:09:40:07 - 00:10:08:22
Ken Nelson: Let's talk about that ERV for a second and how it manages heat as well as cooling. And, you know, we all know that eaves were real popular in the northern climates for retaining heat into the house. But what is he ERV do when it's super hot outside? So this is as this slide was done. We tested one of our Intel Balance ERV products in Phoenix, Arizona with construction instruction, who many of you all know is a is a great test and training facility in Denver.

00:10:08:25 - 00:10:34:14
Ken Nelson: But they were at the time in Phoenix. And the outdoor temperature in Phoenix was 104.69 degrees. And these just to be clear, these are measured at the nozzles of the ERV. So outdoor temperature coming into the air view is 104.69 degrees. Room temperature of the where the ERP was was 71 degrees, but the air temperature coming out of the ERV was only 75 degrees.

00:10:34:16 - 00:10:57:26
Ken Nelson: So your air conditioning only had to pick up three degrees of ventilation temperature, a ventilation air temperature. It was rejecting 91.78 degrees. So in this way, what we wind up with is we don't have an obnoxious ventilation, heating and cooling load. And that's that's a beautiful thing because the we can control the indoor temperature. We can throw money at the indoor temperature.

00:10:57:26 - 00:11:26:13
Ken Nelson: We can add more AC, we can add more heat, we can do all sorts of things, but outdoor. And we still have to have our ventilation from the outdoor air. How do we manage that? The ERV will do that for literally, at that particular value. It's probably less than 50W of energy to bring that kind of air conditioning mitigation into that space, which your air conditioner would, would not be happy trying to resolve.

00:11:26:15 - 00:11:50:04
Ken Nelson: Basically. What is that? At 30 degree delta, your air would be outside the the bandwidth of your air conditioning to be able to provide, demand temperature at that rate. So, Mary, if we could move to the next one. So this is another example that we did in the house in Houston where the ERV, the outdoor temperature was 73 degrees, the indoor temperature was 73 degrees.

00:11:50:06 - 00:12:16:06
Ken Nelson: And this is a big problem when there's no call for air conditioning. So how do we determine that the ERV is actually helping out? Well, if I look at this, the outdoor temperature at 73 degrees, which is 87% humidity, the indoor temperature at 73 degrees after passing through the ERV was 57%. So this, you know, we see things like this, and then we're like, oh, okay.

00:12:16:10 - 00:12:42:12
Ken Nelson: So we need to go and look closer at this. So because that's a big difference right? We're knocking or rejecting 30% of that humidity at that value. Let's go look at some other numbers to make sure that that's a validated, a validated result. So if we get advanced Mary. So okay, here's a cold temperature. It's 28 degrees outside, 68 degrees inside.

00:12:42:18 - 00:13:06:28
Ken Nelson: The return air is 68 degrees. Excuse excuse me. The return air is 61 degrees. And then the air from the house to the air is 68 degrees. So we're we're literally only having to reheat that air by seven degrees. Right. It's a big difference for heating and cooling. Look let's go to the next one because I think the next one has that moisture management.

00:13:07:01 - 00:13:37:21
Ken Nelson: Yeah. Here we go. 71 degrees outside, 71 degrees inside our 70 degrees inside, 83% outside, 55% inside. So when when that 83% humidity comes in and the air and passes through the IRB, it's only coming out of the IRB at 59%. So at 59%, my dew point is 56 degrees, right. At 80%, 83%, my dew point is 65 degrees.

00:13:37:25 - 00:14:05:08
Ken Nelson: And honestly, one of the big goals in all of this testing is we want to make sure that no air enters the house above 60% humidity because at 60% humidity, the dew point is high enough where it can phase change to water on surfaces like toilets, tubs, appliances, metal surfaces, anywhere where during the course of the day the air conditioning is blown on that and chilled that that that area.

00:14:05:10 - 00:14:26:19
Ken Nelson: Now when that temperature starts to mitigate, there's no more air conditioning. That area that that mash temperature is below dew point or has the potential to be below dew point. Water will phase change there and become a problem. So we have to keep that dew point down based on humidity and temperature coming into the house. Go ahead and advance the slide.

00:14:26:21 - 00:14:46:23
Ken Nelson: So in particular in the House, this is another weekly chart that we saw where there's your high temperatures, where the outdoor temperature is blowing up. And you can see that that that daily cycle where the temperature is going high and low. And the adjacent system, these each line in that bottom. And I apologize because they're a little cluttered.

00:14:46:26 - 00:15:18:05
Ken Nelson: But each line in that bottom represents a room in the house. And you can see the room averages around 72 degrees. Basically it's at 3.6°F change or range between all the rooms throughout the house. And that includes the big picture windows in the in the great room, the smaller windows in the bedroom. So the objective here is that the house or the system man manages all of that with a minimized airflow, minimized energy load.

00:15:18:07 - 00:15:46:28
Ken Nelson: Let's go ahead and advance the slide one more time. So here you can see again it's kind of the same data chart. But we're looking at average temperatures for the week 85 to 88 90 degrees average indoor temperatures. And these are you know, these are throughout the 24 hour period, the 73, 73, 73.2. And then you'll see that humidity load, blowing up.

00:15:46:28 - 00:16:09:20
Ken Nelson: And then I can't really tell from my, from my, my visual here. But it winds up basically the outside humidity where it's up high at temperatures it goes down low. The humidity in the house is going to stay really consistent. And that's, that's what it's all about, is providing a living space that is safe and it's not going to create a mold hazard.

00:16:09:20 - 00:16:16:19
Ken Nelson: It's going to be a healthy indoor environment. So, I think there's another slide. Mary.

00:16:16:21 - 00:16:39:10
Ken Nelson: So this is another day where the temperatures were all over the place that excuse me, I said, okay, but another week where the temperatures were all over the place and you can see it's all the way up to 91 degrees with outside humidity, bouncing way up during the lower temperature days. But in the house, it's all very, very consistent and nothing's going above 60%.

00:16:39:10 - 00:17:03:07
Ken Nelson: And that's really is our goal. We want to make sure that 60% value stays stays. It stays below 60% on the indoor humidity. Okay. One more and there we go. And then just another chart telling us the same story. Essentially this is room by room by room. So a lot of great data coming from this. And it's the positive side.

00:17:03:07 - 00:17:32:01
Ken Nelson: It's it's all consistent the week after week after week. It's been consistent. So let's move to the next slide. If I could, if we could show a couple of quick questions, you know, typically reach a stable comfort conditions within it depends on what's going on outside right. Or how much outside. One of the the upside downside is I'll tell you, it's not a super fast change of five or 5 to 6 degrees.

00:17:32:01 - 00:17:51:23
Ken Nelson: It won't do it super fast. It will move predictably, but it won't move super fast. Is it an easy install? It's an absolute easy install. And then where do you put the air handler room? We we have designs for it. On end, end of the structure. We have designs for it in the attic space.

00:17:51:23 - 00:18:17:13
Ken Nelson: We have designs for it in a basement space. We it just really doesn't matter. We can. Whatever your design is, we can adapt, pretty, pretty easily, quite frankly. And then how do how do we how to kind of sonic integrate into this package? What we're going to do is, first of all, the House has certain criteria to be to be, qualified as a, as, Oasis type project.

00:18:17:13 - 00:18:37:13
Ken Nelson: Right. We want the house to have a great envelope and the envelope is important because if it's a leaky envelope, the, you know, the ductless heat pumps won't be your friend. You'll have so much moisture coming in at random spaces that it won't be controllable. It's like any other house, though, and that way, it's really no different.

00:18:37:13 - 00:19:06:25
Ken Nelson: If you have a high performance product in a leaky house, it's not going to be high performance, because high performance really means it's going to work really well around the shoulders. If it has to go full blast, that's not a high performance pathway. So I think we can go. I think that might be the last slide. So I want to get to the questions because Sarah, once Sarah's got some great questions about the health of the, of the house and the occupants inside.

00:19:06:25 - 00:19:09:26
Ken Nelson: And I really want to talk about those as well.

00:19:09:28 - 00:19:41:03
Sara Gutterman: Wonderful. Well, can. Thank you so much. It's always fascinating to hear you talk about the latest project. Curtis, I think I actually want to start with some questions for you, since you are the builder of the ACS house and obviously collaborated very closely with canon, the entire Panasonic team. Let me start just with the fact that, through our cognition smart data, we started seeing even before the pandemic, pretty dramatic increase in interest in, health and wellness in the home.

00:19:41:03 - 00:20:10:14
Sara Gutterman: And, of course, that spiked during the pandemic, and it hasn't really gone backwards since the interest in awareness about health and wellness. In fact, if anything, I think it's just really becoming a baseline expectation. But consumers don't really talk about health and wellness per se. What they really notice is comfort and freshness. Maybe humidity balance can maybe they don't talk about it exactly the way that you do, but they understand what that means, how it makes them feel.

00:20:10:16 - 00:20:34:26
Sara Gutterman: And also I think, how quiet at home can be with, that, you know, the right system. So, Curtis, how should builders and other building professionals start thinking about comfort, health and sustainability as an integrated experience rather than separate features to really match this exploding interest? About wellness in the home.

00:20:34:29 - 00:20:59:08
Curtis Lawson: You know, I think first of all, that, like traditionally, builders have thought more about, like, energy, energy efficiency. That's always one of the first questions I get from builders is, well, is it efficient? Whereas when I talk to homeowners, that's not really the question that I get. So I kind of think there might be a disconnect there with builders, kind of what, what we as builders think people want and what people really do want set up.

00:20:59:11 - 00:21:26:22
Curtis Lawson: That's my first point. But, yeah. So comfort and and wellness, it's a it's more about, it's more than about just, temperature. Right? I mean, as you mentioned, comfort is it's noise, it's humidity level. It's how clean the air is. It's all these things. And so, that's one of the, the fascinating things I think about the Oasis system.

00:21:26:24 - 00:21:46:05
Curtis Lawson: You know, Oasis is not just a product. It's not just an air conditioning unit. It's a it's a system. It's a way of managing all these things at once. Right. So through the ERV and to me, the RV is the heart of the system. Right. But, through the ERV, we're managing so many things. You know, we're pre filtering the air as it comes in.

00:21:46:05 - 00:22:09:20
Curtis Lawson: We're managing the humidity as it comes into the house. We're constantly exchanging the air. So one of the very first comments that I get from people when they walk into our, our concept home is, wow, this place just smells fresh, it smells clean, it feels comfortable. And, you know, I can't say that I get that on other, you know, like open house events that I have had, with other types of systems.

00:22:09:20 - 00:22:34:21
Curtis Lawson: It's like when they walk into the oasis, our house, one of the first things they say is it is feels and smells nice in here. Right. So I think that that's that's something that people really notice and they really key in on. And I think that once people experience that, that they want to have that. So I think we as builders are doing, sometimes people a disservice by focusing just on the energy efficiency portion.

00:22:34:23 - 00:22:59:04
Curtis Lawson: Because I think that, you know, obviously, Oasis and the Panasonic products are efficient. But I think most products in the market today are efficient. There's no AC company that's advertising or selling an efficient AC equipment in today's market. Right. So, really providing something to our buyers that are homeowners that feels different, that supports their health and wellness is is super, super important.

00:22:59:06 - 00:23:19:03
Curtis Lawson: And the last thing I'll say on that is, especially when you have, immunocompromised, people or young children, elderly, those sorts of people really, really, need better indoor air quality and all these components that go into Oasis or even more important, for those people.

00:23:19:06 - 00:23:51:04
Sara Gutterman: Thanks, Curtis. I want to, follow up with a question for you again. Many builders hesitate to adopt something that feels completely new, but one of the most interesting aspects of the Oasis concept is that it uses familiar technologies, like then fans, purification systems, many split RVs, just in an integrated and smarter way. So why is innovation through integration more practical in this application than trying to introduce entirely new technologies?

00:23:51:04 - 00:24:10:14
Sara Gutterman: And, you know, in other words, builders, if they're worried about complexity or cost or retraining trades when adopting new systems, you know, from your perspective, how does this approach, address some of those big concerns?

00:24:10:16 - 00:24:36:06
Curtis Lawson: Yeah. I mean, I think that as builders, we're always nervous to introduce new things, because, like you said, we have to train our trades. We're busy, we don't have time, and we're nervous about, you know, dropping something new on the trays and on our team. Right. So anytime that we can use the off the shelf components, that we're already familiar with, like most Hvac contractor contractors, installers already know how to put in a mini split.

00:24:36:08 - 00:25:00:01
Curtis Lawson: A lot of them, if they don't know already, they're they've been learning recently and it's becoming more common to install RVs. So that's generally nothing new. So yeah, I mean, using off the shelf components, just makes us, as builders, more comfortable. It makes our installers more comfortable. And honestly, it makes our homeowners more comfortable as well because they're not seeing, I mean, other than new RVs, which are still newer to some homeowners.

00:25:00:03 - 00:25:23:07
Curtis Lawson: But, you know, we're not we're not introducing some some cosmic new thing that no one's ever heard of. And that also makes them feel better on the, on the, the maintenance side, on the warranty side. And it makes us, the builders feel better on that side as well. Because we know when it comes time for for service for maintenance, replacement down the road, you know, we're not having to to find some really hard to find thing to, to swap out.

00:25:23:07 - 00:25:48:24
Curtis Lawson: So but as far as, like how, you know, all these things working together, you know, I, I'm, I'm a really big proponent of the concept as a house, as a system. You know, I think for a long time, before houses were being built as tight as they are today. You could kind of interchangeably swap things out and not really worry about kind of how things that are played.

00:25:48:27 - 00:26:08:09
Curtis Lawson: But with houses being built so tight, and with the kind of the stakes being so high on if something's done wrong, you really need to approach the house as a whole integrated system, right? You're building envelope, you're ventilation, you're at, you're at your AC strategy. Everything kind of has to work together to set you up for success.

00:26:08:11 - 00:26:30:20
Curtis Lawson: And so I think that's why, the Oasis concept is fantastic because it really addresses all of those things. Right? But because for eight, for Oasis to exceed, we also need to succeed. We need to be building a high performance envelope, and then we're taking that. We're maximizing the performance of that envelope with a system with all these individual components that are designed to work together.

00:26:30:23 - 00:26:34:02
Curtis Lawson: I'm not sure that answers your question, and maybe Ken has something to add to that as well.

00:26:34:04 - 00:27:07:09
Sara Gutterman: Now that's great. And actually, let's riff on this concept. The house is a system. Can, I've got a question for you. In traditional construction, the builder would often set goals for Hvac performance, but then hand off, the project to a mechanical contractor who often chose or chooses, the simplest installation path. But what changes when the mechanical system is actually designed up front with load calculations, airflow planning, duct routing, and commissioning guidelines that are already designed?

00:27:07:12 - 00:27:39:16
Ken Nelson: Yeah, that's that's a great question. Right. Because what we're what we're talking about is, is an outcome based product rather than a convenient based product for the installer. I mean, oftentimes installers will have, a process that they've done in the past that's just unique to their material that the mechanicals they're installing. But what we're looking for now is an outcome and not necessarily, an installer who's just done the same thing over and over and over for the last hundred years, or who cares how long, but and that's what we run into.

00:27:39:16 - 00:28:05:28
Ken Nelson: Well, I've never done it like this before. I've never done that before. And it takes a minute for them to understand that, to get to the outcome that we want, which is not a mediocre outcome by any stretch, they're going to have to pay attention, right? They're going to have to make sure that the ducks aren't compromised in the in the installation space, make sure that, ducting hasn't compromised at the, at the fan assembly.

00:28:06:00 - 00:28:22:08
Ken Nelson: So and yeah, we get a lot of contractors who just want to put in the lowest cost and kind of be honest with you. One of the things is it's important to me is that everybody has to make money on this project, right? It does. None of us are community service people. We have to make money.

00:28:22:08 - 00:28:42:25
Ken Nelson: The more, the more houses you build, and the more you make money, the more houses you will build. And we need more housing in America. Bah! Not. We need a lot more housing. So I need everyone to be successful. But it it's not always the best route. Come on. We took 5 or 10 years ago. At times have changed.

00:28:42:25 - 00:29:05:26
Ken Nelson: Times are changing. And I think with the Oasis package, it it's it's a simple, simple install. And for, contractor, once they embrace it, even even the contractor who worked on the Oasis house two days and he's like, Holy cow, I got this. This is easy. There's no big trunk lines. I don't have to go through any trusses.

00:29:05:28 - 00:29:34:21
Ken Nelson: I don't have to modify trusses. I don't have to do anything. All I need is a grid, a six inch duct, and the fans are all aligned. The builders already aligned, all the fans in a in a pathway that allows me to dock from point to point. So it's it's, kind of getting away from your question, but it's, it's about recognizing some new challenges and putting all that together and then learning how easily that can be done.

00:29:34:23 - 00:29:38:01
Sara Gutterman: Thanks. Can, Curtis, did you have something you wanted to add?

00:29:38:03 - 00:30:00:01
Curtis Lawson: Yeah, I just wanted to say that, you know, the the Hvac design part of this, takes the guesswork away from the contractor, from the builder and the mechanical contractor, which is which is one of the key parts of the oasis concept. Is that our building performance, designer is going is going to do some Hvac design.

00:30:00:01 - 00:30:15:12
Curtis Lawson: They're going to work with the Panasonic team to to come up with all the duct layouts, all the equipment specs. So there's really no guesswork on the on the builder or the AC contractor side is basically just just being able to follow instructions right? It's really straightforward.

00:30:15:14 - 00:30:48:00
Sara Gutterman: Thanks, Curtis. All right. Can I've got a question for you. And then Curtis and I come back to you. I'm going to we we've gotten a couple of questions from the audience about Irv. So I'm going to weave my question about Irv into a couple of questions from the audience. So this will be layered. So I want to talk specifically about EVs because, there's a lot of talk about them, but we find that, some of our audience members and, you know, building builders and building professionals still don't fully understand their role.

00:30:48:00 - 00:31:10:02
Sara Gutterman: So can you talk about what Irv is actually do for homes, indoor air quality and humidity balance. And then, also talk about availability, because there were two questions about availability. Because there seems to be some spotty distribution as well as contractor pricing.

00:31:10:04 - 00:31:30:29
Ken Nelson: So drives are my favorite topic. And that's really what I'm doing right now, is I'm going coast to coast to talk about IRBs and why they're important. And the reason they're important is because, you know, in our building world, ventilation air is critical. We have to have ventilation in a house. I want everyone to build a nice, tight envelope.

00:31:31:01 - 00:31:54:18
Ken Nelson: But when you build a nice tight envelope, ventilation air is can be compromised without a mechanical process. So and I talk about ventilation like every builder probably talks about their jobs. And that is I want ventilation to be predictable and uneventful. Right? I don't want to have to wait for a wind to blow. I don't want to have to wait for the temperature to be just right so I can open a window.

00:31:54:20 - 00:32:20:05
Ken Nelson: I want it to be there every day, all day, all night. So the ERV manages ventilation air. So your code is going to say your standards. You're going to say you're going to have to have 30, 60, 9000, whatever CFM of air continuously coming into your house. And that's where the Urb comes into effect. I can take that air, I filter it, I can Humidify or Humidify depending on the climate zone.

00:32:20:05 - 00:32:52:09
Ken Nelson: And the temperature is indoor, outdoor, and I can basically get it to temperature within, you know, a 92. Think about a 90% efficient ERV, meaning that I have 70 degrees inside, 50 degrees outside. 90% of that 20 degree delta is 18 degrees. My heating and cooling system only has to move two degrees. So super efficient. And because it's part of the natural physics, we can do it for the price of running two ECM motored vans less than 50W of energy.

00:32:52:11 - 00:33:14:00
Ken Nelson: Right. What what is your air conditioning going to have to do? Your heating source going to have to do to try to make up that 20 degree delta? It's going to have to do a lot more than 50W of energy. So I can tell you that, and I just did this for, a utility where we calculated the energy savings and climate zone five.

00:33:14:02 - 00:33:42:19
Ken Nelson: And it was $200 a year in energy savings in climate zone five, 4500 heating degree days. It provided, you know, 100 and 180 to $200 of energy savings over the course of a year. So it pays for itself, in no time. The true rub the two challenge with IRBs is, is to help help our occupants and our, builders understand that there's also filtration involved, and that filter is going to get compromised and it has to be managed.

00:33:42:22 - 00:34:04:10
Ken Nelson: So again, you know, if you're doing a $200 savings, the cost of filters are pretty insignificant compared to that. And if you have compromised people within your house, those filters are going to be, those they're they're worth their weight in gold. So and as far as, finding product, I'm, I'm disappointed to hear that because there are a lot of manufacturers who are producing IRBs.

00:34:04:13 - 00:34:24:26
Ken Nelson: And I will tell you that, and I love our Panasonic IRBs. Don't get me wrong, I think we make a great IRB, but I will tell you that the worst IRB on the market is far, far better than the best exhaust only strategy or the best supply only strategy. And there are a lot of IRBs on the market.

00:34:24:28 - 00:34:47:13
Ken Nelson: We make some very, very good ones. And to a builder, I will tell the builder there's basically four things like configuration. There's supply air pressure drop that I look for. There's the the core, whether it's a cross flow or counter flow. And then there's sound and then filtration. I guess that's five five pillars. The sound and all of those.

00:34:47:13 - 00:35:11:20
Ken Nelson: Panasonic really does hit on all all cylinders and those applications. So if if there's a problem in a specific market, if you could put that in the chat, I will I will find someone who can reach out to you or I will reach out to you and tell you where where you can source IRBs. But they should be readily available in all markets in the U.S. and Canada.

00:35:11:22 - 00:35:24:03
Sara Gutterman: Thanks, Ken. One more quick question. And then, Curtis, I'm coming back to you. We've had a couple of questions about the application of this integrated system into retrofits. Can you talk about that a little bit, please?

00:35:24:05 - 00:35:49:12
Ken Nelson: So the Oasis is challenging and retrofits, right. Because we do have to add that air handler room. I'm not saying it's impossible. I'm just saying it's challenging. If you're doing a complete gut rehab, it's probably pretty darn easy. I will tell you, though, that it's going to start with your envelope. You're going to have to be able to, you know, blower door test your envelope below 1.5 ACH, to make it a truly an effective strategy.

00:35:49:12 - 00:36:18:03
Ken Nelson: But if but yeah, we can do all sorts of interesting things, especially with like Adas and dados where I have these smaller footprints as well. We have currently projects on the books for multifamily where we're doing townhouse style, applications. So, so there's a lot of ways to get there. But in a retrofit, I'm going to need clean walls and access to productive for access to a space on mechanical space and clean space.

00:36:18:03 - 00:36:23:25
Ken Nelson: If you will. And distribution area things can.

00:36:23:27 - 00:36:55:04
Sara Gutterman: Curtis, can you talk with us about, some of the lessons that you learned when you built the Oasis House? What surprised you most about how the system worked in real time and in the real world? And, what you learned that might change how you will design homes in the future. And kind of the third layer of that is, I know that there were some, actual people that lived in the house for a while and, talk a little bit about it, please integrate their feedback into your response to this question.

00:36:55:07 - 00:36:55:21
Curtis Lawson: Yeah.

00:36:55:24 - 00:37:12:05
Curtis Lawson: So I think what surprised me the most was one of the things that I mentioned a while ago was just kind of the comments that I got around, how fresh and clean everything smelled. I knew the the system was going to be effective, but I wasn't kind of, prepared probably the number of comments that I got around that.

00:37:12:05 - 00:37:38:19
Curtis Lawson: So that was fantastic. Functionally, I've just been really impressed at how temperatures have been managed. I know kitchen showed some slides a minute ago with some data. There's a lot of numbers on there. But the the big picture is from the in fact, the month after we commissioned the house and they and Panasonic took it over after we built it, we had like temperatures in the 20s with snow on the ground, which is super unusual here in Houston.

00:37:38:21 - 00:38:05:09
Curtis Lawson: And then a few months later, we had 105 degrees. And every time I went in the house, the temperature was was super, you know, consistent even. It felt comfortable. Everything was regulated. So that was one really big surprise to me was how effectively it was handled from kind of a two temperature extremes. And then all kind of all the, all the humidity, fluctuations that we deal with here in Houston.

00:38:05:10 - 00:38:25:20
Curtis Lawson: So, that was kind of a surprise on the installation side, there was really no surprises. I mean, we kind of had a really good picture of what the installation was going to look like before we started. But, you know, as I mentioned, it's super easy to install. It's all I would say, the only, a little bit tricky thing.

00:38:25:20 - 00:38:49:17
Curtis Lawson: And it, I think is that tricky was when you have in our, in our case we had 27, transfer fans which are essentially the Panasonic bathroom exhaust fans, but we're calling them transfer fans. But for people who are familiar with products, they're kind of their bathrooms. Right? We had 27 of those in one closet, and that meant 27 six inch home runs coming into that closet.

00:38:49:19 - 00:39:06:21
Curtis Lawson: So there was a little bit of, you know, making sure that we had space for all those ducts to run to make sure the ducks didn't get crimped and bent and all that kind of stuff. That was the only thing is a little bit challenging, which is just making sure that we we had those pathways there. But, you know, we had some great planning up front.

00:39:06:21 - 00:39:26:04
Curtis Lawson: So we knew it would work. But sometimes in the field, you know, you had to make a few adjustments to make it happen. As far as the is the arc of the occupants, they were Panasonic employees, so I'd had to let Ken, probably speak to that a little bit more. I didn't always have direct contact with them.

00:39:26:07 - 00:39:31:18
Curtis Lawson: So, can you might want to chime in on, on, on what their experience was.

00:39:31:21 - 00:39:56:14
Ken Nelson: Yeah. And they're going to echo exactly what Kurt has said about how comfortable the house was. And I always take, you know, when it's our Panasonic employee, you got to take that with a little grain of salt because of their bias. But, you know, even when I went in there and I'll tell you right now, they were, you know, cross-cultural employees that were there who have different lifestyles and life expectancies and, and processes.

00:39:56:16 - 00:40:19:20
Ken Nelson: The house was neutral. I mean, you're not you're not smelling anything from the kids. You're not smelling anything from the kitchen. That part of it, I thought was actually pretty remarkable because they did have a different cultural, processes for cooking and cleaning and so forth. So it was kind of kind of interesting there. But yeah.

00:40:19:20 - 00:40:21:11
Ken Nelson: Go ahead.

00:40:21:13 - 00:40:41:25
Curtis Lawson: I was just going to say that, also and, so about the occupants, what Ken is beating around the bush at was they had a different kind of expectation on temperature range that's comfortable to them, in the country that they came from, they generally kept things a lot warmer than we do here in the US inside the house.

00:40:41:27 - 00:40:58:23
Curtis Lawson: And so, there was a lot of like, hey, let's we have some meetings here. Let's get this back down to kind of a nice, normal, US temperatures. But for their comfort level, it was also very comfortable for them. And then when we had when we had events at the house, we would drop the temperature back down to where we wanted it to be.

00:40:58:27 - 00:41:28:14
Curtis Lawson: And it was also very comfortable there as well. Till the last thing that popped into my head was regarding noise. We talked about surprises, things that I was impressed or surprised about. You know, when you have 27 fans that are running 24 hours a day, seven days a week, plus too many splits, plus a RV, we also had to add a fire, which is not part of Oasis, but we also had a humidifier that we were doing some testing with as well.

00:41:28:16 - 00:41:49:24
Curtis Lawson: So we have a lot of equipment in the house running 24 over seven. There was virtually no noise in the house. I was really, really blown away by how how quiet the system was. You know, when you have a typical forced air system, when that outside unit kicks on and off, you have you have surges. You have you have a lot of noise, you have the rush of air moving.

00:41:49:27 - 00:41:54:11
Curtis Lawson: And overall, the system was very, very quiet.

00:41:54:13 - 00:42:19:02
Ken Nelson: So to add on to that, you know, not only did we and and to Curtis's chagrin, he built us a beautiful house and then after he hand it over, here comes my guys putting in testing measurement devices. Every every room has at least 3 to 9 test devices or sensors to measure temperature, humidity, PM 2.5 carbon dioxide.

00:42:19:04 - 00:42:39:09
Ken Nelson: I don't even know all the other things that they're measuring there, but one of the things that we learned is even when we had large populations in the space and we've been using it as meeting space, we've Curtis has used it with his, Houston Home Builders Association, Greater bringing people in and we monitor carbon dioxide loads.

00:42:39:10 - 00:43:04:08
Ken Nelson: Right. So literally the carbon dioxide load has a has a ceiling of about 600 ppm, which is interesting because when you put some 20 people in there, there is the potential. It could get really, really high. This is just a 20 700 square foot house. But because of the way the air change works, you never get this excessive concentration of of carbon dioxide.

00:43:04:08 - 00:43:20:24
Ken Nelson: So if you had kids, you know, 2 or 3 kids or you had the whole junior high football team over in one of the bedrooms, you would never see, an obnoxious carbon dioxide load because you're exchanging that air four times an hour. So it's constantly flush. And that was one of the things that we're learning is that.

00:43:20:26 - 00:43:44:12
Ken Nelson: But all these sensors and so forth, we don't get we don't get any problematic air, pockets within the house, which is kind of remarkable. So, so there's a lot of things that we're truly learning, including about humidity and, and moisture and temperature within the house and how surface temperatures can be modified or changed when you have air blowing on them and whatnot.

00:43:44:15 - 00:43:52:03
Ken Nelson: So it's it's been kind of kind of fun adventure, if you will, from that respect.

00:43:52:06 - 00:44:13:24
Sara Gutterman: So, Curtis, kind of going back up to a higher level, is a builder or building professionals interested in delivering healthy homes, but a little feels a little overwhelmed by the idea of changing their mechanical strategy. Where would they where should they start? What are your your tips for success? For them?

00:44:13:27 - 00:44:33:25
Curtis Lawson: Yeah, I think you have to start with a great team. And that team needs to have a build it, a building performance consultant, a performance designer. I think this is a shift in thinking for a lot of builders, you know, because we've got our, you know, our architect or, you know, in-house designer, interior designer, engineer, a structural engineer.

00:44:33:27 - 00:44:56:05
Curtis Lawson: And we think that's generally our team. Right. But nowadays, regardless whether it's Oasis or any mechanical strategy these days, with the way that we're building homes, how tight we're building homes, I think it's super important to have a building performance consultant, as part of your team. And that's a couple thousand dollars. And I realize a couple of thousand dollars is a big deal.

00:44:56:07 - 00:45:19:12
Curtis Lawson: You know, it's money, but it's. I see it as a layer of protection for me. It helps limit my liability. It's also it also educates me every time we do it. But that building performance consultant is someone who's going to waste the companies that we use. They're going to handle all the blower door testing. They're going to handle all the paperwork for, the energy side of things for permitting.

00:45:19:15 - 00:45:38:29
Curtis Lawson: They're going to help, you know, do inspections through the process. So there's a lot that we're getting for that money that we're spending with them. But having a performance consultant, I think is the number one thing that you need to do. And they're also generally going to do some Hvac design. And in the case of Oasis, they are going to work with Panasonic.

00:45:38:29 - 00:45:59:18
Curtis Lawson: And Panasonic has specific people that they're partnering with as consultants for, for you for these, for these projects, for Oasis. But they're basically to work with Panasonic to make sure that all the equipment specified properly, all the ducks are designed properly. They're going to come out after install, they're going to look at it, they're going to do some verification, make sure everything is done right.

00:45:59:21 - 00:46:20:23
Curtis Lawson: So, you know, having that that person or that company to provide that service, that's the most important thing in my opinion. And then beyond that, I think it's really important that you work with a, a manufacturer who's going to offer really good support. Obviously, I'm here with Ken and we're talking about Panasonic stuff. Panasonic has a fantastic support team.

00:46:20:23 - 00:46:39:01
Curtis Lawson: They are really there for builders. But there's a lot of other companies out there who also provide a really good support. And that's that's something that I think that we as builders, especially kind of old school guys who've been in this for a long time. AC aside, I think we don't lean on our trade or our vendor partners enough.

00:46:39:01 - 00:47:01:12
Curtis Lawson: There's so many resources out there for us, whether it's AC, plumbing, paint, flooring, whatever it is. All of these companies have great manufacturers support if you if you'll just make the phone call. Right. So in our case, you know, even if this wasn't the Panasonic concept home, I, I call Ken all the time and like, hey Ken, I've got this house that I'm working on.

00:47:01:12 - 00:47:12:17
Curtis Lawson: What do you think about this product or, you know, this design, right? So having a great manufacturer relationship, I think is equally as important as having a great building performance consultant.

00:47:12:20 - 00:47:22:10
Sara Gutterman: So Curtis, that's kind of dovetail into my next question, Ken, for you, which is can you talk a little bit about Panasonic's builder certification and support program?

00:47:22:12 - 00:47:42:22
Ken Nelson: It's funny, I was just going to go there. Right. So our, our builder program, we have a website where and we, we are actively looking for builders who want to be a part of the program. So but you would go to the website, you would, review some of the criteria because again, not all builders are going to be able to be successful with those.

00:47:42:22 - 00:48:05:22
Ken Nelson: Right? You it needs to be a builder who consciously, wants to provide a high performance product for an occupant. Health. It's not just for an occupant health, but for an occupant comfort, you know, program that that's going to continue to, to serve that occupants all down the line here in the next 20 years if you up.

00:48:05:24 - 00:48:38:21
Ken Nelson: So you would go to the, Oasis website and go into the builder program. You'd sign in. We have a person who will give you a call. Curtis talked about our MVP program. We would review your plans, talk about how we can fit the Oasis package into your your design. Because really, what I don't want to do is I don't want to go to a builder and say, well, I'm going to I'm going to scramble your architectural process and, you know, change the way you build, to satisfy my objectives with Oasis.

00:48:38:23 - 00:48:57:27
Ken Nelson: So I want to be able to put my package in with your package and allow that builder to show his brand, his uniqueness and his quality. So so it's a pretty straight ahead process once you get started. And then we just integrate our team into your so our, into that builder's team.

00:48:57:29 - 00:49:26:21
Sara Gutterman: Okay. Thanks. Can so I've got one more question for both of you. And then I'm going to ask Mike to come back and ask a few more questions that audience members have posed. But let's talk about the future of health and wellness in the home. So, first Curtis and then Ken. Are there any wellness related, either products and technologies or just general trends that you are watching that you have your eyes keenly on that?

00:49:26:23 - 00:49:30:02
Sara Gutterman: We should all be paying attention to.

00:49:30:04 - 00:49:30:16
Curtis Lawson: I had a.

00:49:30:16 - 00:49:58:25
Curtis Lawson: Lot of, a lot of customers over the last few years, and it's getting to be more and more really keying in on, zero VOC. And I think, I think Rovio is pretty much the standard, but zero VOC is really what people are asking about. So I think that's that's a big thing. And I think something that goes along with building tighter homes and getting, carbon monoxide out of the home is, is electrification.

00:49:58:27 - 00:50:21:27
Curtis Lawson: So, looking more at, you know, obviously heat pump AC systems, but also induction ranges, is, is a is a big, big thing that we've been talking about with customers over the last couple of years. But I would say that those two things are the biggest for me. So zero VOC and induction ranges, heat pump water heaters also.

00:50:21:29 - 00:50:41:17
Sara Gutterman: We're seeing we're seeing all of those things trend as well. In fact, just a quick caveat. It's pretty funny because when we talk with our members of our consumer audience that are younger, say, millennials, Gen Zs, even emerging alphas, who will be who will start buying homes in the next 4 to 5 years. The oldest houses, when we talk about induction cooktop.

00:50:41:17 - 00:51:00:12
Sara Gutterman: So their response is, why would I want to burn gas in my home? Right. That's gross. That makes homes blow up. You know, they don't say, oh, you know, they don't have the same mindset where, cooking with gas was, you know, considered to be the luxury. So, things have really changed pretty quickly, generationally. We're certainly within that category.

00:51:00:12 - 00:51:02:23
Sara Gutterman: Ken, how would you respond to that question?

00:51:02:26 - 00:51:23:17
Ken Nelson: So one of the things that we're seeing is more like automated trigger programs, right? So do I have to turn a bad fan on? I mean, I had three girls that I raised and none of them would turn a bad fan on whatever state that bathroom fan was on was in when they went in, was what it was when they came out.

00:51:23:17 - 00:51:46:23
Ken Nelson: If it was off, they would sit there with the blow dryer and clear the air. Right? I mean, so automated triggers like condensation sensors to activate fan CO2, sensors to activate from low speed to high speed on your eaves or your, your whole house ventilation. We already have that with thermostats, right? We have a thermostat that's an automated sensor, so I don't have to go in and get cold air fire or whatever, you know?

00:51:46:26 - 00:52:14:06
Ken Nelson: So we're seeing more and more of stuff like this in the industry from a federal standpoint. We're seeing more about fault detection, right? Listen, we want a bell to go off when it's not working. So so we have those as well that we're looking into. Also more efficient ways to get distribution of, fresh air. And again, filtration is important.

00:52:14:08 - 00:52:36:07
Ken Nelson: You know, I'll go back on, on and I one of the things I talked to build it all the time is about filtration. Because filtration has no value to bring air in if it's contaminated. So but we talk a lot about, how to move air within the house so that you don't have stagnant air in spaces like closets and even attic spaces.

00:52:36:07 - 00:52:45:08
Ken Nelson: So we're seeing that kind of thing as well. But right now, I would say the big the big discussion is automated triggers.

00:52:45:11 - 00:53:19:10
Sara Gutterman: Actually, I'm glad that you brought that up because proactive IQ systems has for a long time been the number one response when we survey our consumer audience in terms of, you know, their top priorities for, indoor environment quality or healthy home upgrades, they want those systems that proactively, can monitor and send toxins and humidity and VOCs and pollen and, you know, other particulates in the air, and then, turn on events and or arrange to run the ERV.

00:53:19:12 - 00:53:34:22
Sara Gutterman: Can actually, I want to ask you one more quick question, because I get this a lot and I want to hear you say this because I don't think I've ever asked you this question, and I want to make sure I'm answering it properly. What is the difference between air purification and air filtration?

00:53:34:24 - 00:53:59:29
Ken Nelson: Well, certainly. Filtration. From a straight ahead perspective, filtration is just pushing air past a filter. And, and, and basically capturing problematic, components or particulate. Right. It's just capturing that. And and I'll come back to that in a second where purification is where once something gets in. And typically with purification I'm talking about active virus or bacteria, something that's alive.

00:54:00:00 - 00:54:33:04
Ken Nelson: Right. And purification is a very difficult, component in the residential industry because it's it's trying to kill something. Right? Even though it's a virus or a or a bacterial piece, it's trying to kill that. So we had to be very careful how we do, how we do purification. And even in our nanotechnology, the nano is basically an energized hydrogen molecule that touches another hydrogen molecule, which is typically in a water molecule.

00:54:33:04 - 00:54:53:07
Ken Nelson: Right. Because hydrogen is two parts hydrogen, one part oxygen from water, paper. And that energy touches that and it gets a slight electrostatic shock. So anything that was alive and bacteria have to be and viruses have to have water vapor to stay alive. So that changes that bacteria that's in that water vapor. And that's all we do.

00:54:53:08 - 00:55:16:14
Ken Nelson: There's ultraviolet light, which is somewhat problematic. Right? We all know that we don't want to be taking on massive ultraviolet light as humans. And the way we do it within that is it's all within the air handler room or within the ductless head. Quite frankly, it never sees the human area, the space where people are living. But filtration is, is another thing, right?

00:55:16:14 - 00:55:41:21
Ken Nelson: We we also you know, it used to be we would never advocate putting a filter inside the house because why would you want to filter capture, you know, particulars before they're exhausted out of the house. But in in our case here we're since we're recirculating so much air, we are putting Merv six filter curtains for dust. And we have a merge six filter on the air conditioner head that ductless head.

00:55:41:24 - 00:56:11:02
Ken Nelson: And in other situations you can increase those built that filtration process to help capture even more stuff. And I know, you know, I'm in the northwest. And as you remember, when you were in the northwest, we got our wildfire season, which, you know, there is there's that's a difficult time in a person's life during wildfire season because unlike pollens and stuff that affects certain people certain ways, wildfire smoke affects every creature that breathes air.

00:56:11:04 - 00:56:42:08
Ken Nelson: Right? And every creature, whether it's humans and pets, all that. So to manage wildfire smoke is a whole different animal, and we can mitigate some of that with our Merv 13. But we also have the potential to add Hepa filters and so forth. So, I'm a bigger proponent of filtration than I am. Purification. But at the end of the day, I spend a lot of time talking about strategies for filtration, and I would encourage everyone to consider that.

00:56:43:09 - 00:56:48:12
Sara Gutterman: Thank you. Can. Yeah. The, the wildfire comments, resonate with me. I'm at 9000ft in the air.

00:56:48:12 - 00:56:51:01
Ken Nelson: Yes, that's right near Telluride.

00:56:51:01 - 00:57:10:19
Sara Gutterman: And we don't have a C, we don't have air conditioning. So in the summer it gets up to maybe sev mid 70. And we just open our windows and, you know, have some fans and wildfire smoke is a big concern for us, a big concern for a lot of reasons. With that, Mike, I know you've got a couple more questions from the audience.

00:57:10:21 - 00:57:20:15
Sara Gutterman: So we may run over for a few minutes, but, Ken and Curtis, thank you both for responding to my questions. I have found this fascinating. Mike, take it away.

00:57:20:17 - 00:57:43:25
Mike Collignon: All right. Thank you. Sarah. I wanted to pass along a couple more questions from our audience members. So I'll. This one goes to both of you because I'm not sure if this was applicable with the Oasis home or not. Jeff wanted to know, how well does this integrate with Eero sealed ductwork? I think it integrates.

00:57:43:25 - 00:58:11:07
Ken Nelson: Well, I mean, first of all, when we're transmitting temperature, air to air and temperature from the air handler room, we want a perfect duct system. I don't want we want the temperature in the air to come to the space where it's designed to go to. I don't want it to leak out in other places. So it's important that you have a complete ducted system, and that system has to be, it.

00:58:11:08 - 00:58:37:10
Ken Nelson: Well, and quite frankly, it'll be tested. We're going to test the output of the fan, and we're going to test the output of that grill. Registered diffuser. And they need to be within 2%. Right. Or less because I don't want to just dump random air into some space and not get it where it needs to go. So I'm a big supporter of the aero seal program, certainly on the envelope, certainly on ducting.

00:58:37:12 - 00:58:47:02
Ken Nelson: I think that everything that makes that envelope better is, is all good. Okay, okay, here's some follow up on that.

00:58:47:05 - 00:59:07:17
Curtis Lawson: No, I agree, I think I think, doing aero seal on the, on the envelope in particular would be a great strategy. We didn't do it on this house. We got down to, like, 1.4. ACH, without going there, we probably could have got sub one if we'd have done that. But, you know, 1.4 that our needs for what we're doing and, there's some there's some diminishing returns past that.

00:59:07:20 - 00:59:31:23
Mike Collignon: Right. Okay. Cool. So Michael asks an interesting question. Not me, a different one. Why use a ductless heat pump with, you know, fans and then and then some other ducting versus a ducted, say, cold climate heat pump air handler that's integrated with an ERV. You've got a couple different choices there. Why go with one over the other?

00:59:31:25 - 00:59:56:02
Ken Nelson: Well, first of all, we like the system in Houston in particular because we and we did two single zone, two time systems. But when we're talking about managing humidity, humidity or in air conditioning, we want to pull all that moisture out and we need space over the coils. And I could have done a little we could we could have got by with a three time.

00:59:56:04 - 01:00:23:22
Ken Nelson: I mean, that was well within the, the, the predictability of the of the temperature and whatnot. However, with two single zones, we were able to pull more moisture out of the air at less speed. So it worked out really well there. Plus, the Oasis house is kind of it's, you know, initially when we put this all together and in our generation two and generation three designs that are out that are in the future, you'll have solar and battery, right.

01:00:23:22 - 01:00:55:16
Ken Nelson: And if I do two single zone systems in this in the same area of the room, I can literally have, an environmental failure outside where there's no power. And now I could run one single unit and have environmental controls within the house. And the eco again, it becomes a true safe space for the occupants. If you have a compromised occupant or a compromised family member, this Oasis project, you really need to take a hard look at this, because this is designed to to provide a safe space.

01:00:55:16 - 01:01:11:21
Ken Nelson: And that's kind of what the name behind it, the Oasis. And to be clear, we could do it in a different process. I mean, that's not out of the wheelhouse. It's just this was the best strategy for the application that we were using. We were creating.

01:01:11:24 - 01:01:32:01
Curtis Lawson: Yeah. So I'll follow up. So, I think one of the things that Ken mentioned about the ability to run one unit off of solar and battery is, is huge. We, they didn't mention that, but, so far. But we did that on this house. We have, a solar strategy on this house as well, solar and battery strategy and able to run the system off of one unit.

01:01:32:01 - 01:01:52:20
Curtis Lawson: So that's part of it. But also just some real some, some redundancy for, the event that, you know, one of the units were to go down. So we have too many split units within the air handler room. If one of those units were to go off line, need repair, need to get replaced, whatever the other unit is capable of, of, of operating the whole house.

01:01:52:23 - 01:02:00:02
Curtis Lawson: So you have a little backup there in case of, you know, maintenance or something breaking down.

01:02:00:04 - 01:02:08:14
Mike Collignon: Well, you mentioned redundancy. I mean, given that you're talking about solar and battery, that also gives you redundancy in case of a power outage. Correct?

01:02:08:17 - 01:02:08:26
Curtis Lawson: Yep.

01:02:08:29 - 01:02:21:19
Mike Collignon: Right now, I wanted to get to Aaron's question as well. Wanted to know if, Curtis, did you install an active or a passive radon mitigation system in this home?

01:02:21:21 - 01:02:40:21
Curtis Lawson: We did not. We don't have a radon issue in, in our area at all, and it's not required. So so we didn't do it. And honestly, I've been in Texas my whole life for the most part. And so we don't really have that issue here. Ken might be able to speak on that, and some other markets and how that might work.

01:02:40:23 - 01:03:01:14
Mike Collignon: Yeah. How does that work? And is that does that throw anything off or not? Can you talk a little about radon mitigation system? Because I live here in the Midwest and it's not uncommon at all to see them in homes. Right. So I'm just curious, from an airflow, an air handling perspective. So your, your energy management group would, would go in and look at that.

01:03:01:14 - 01:03:20:06
Ken Nelson: And what we would probably do in this particular case is we would seal that floor space. Remember, we're going to seal the envelope. You're still going to do an active, if not an active a passive mitigation system in the, in the, you know, the crawlspace area, right, with your rock and your big screen and your and your pipe up to the center of the house.

01:03:20:08 - 01:03:38:08
Ken Nelson: All of that will be the same, but we would seal, you know, we would probably do whether it's, seal that floor somehow, shape some way, shape or form, whether it's closed shell or something along those lines in Houston. We did. And correct me if I'm wrong, because we have water that comes from the ground up.

01:03:38:10 - 01:04:03:08
Ken Nelson: We did a closed shell flooring, insulation on the flooring, and then we did open shell in the attic space. So again, you know, a that's part of your your MVP is going to look at your water, how things move through that house and protect the house, protect the occupants based on that. And again this is a you know a comfort a comfort cost and safety cost that we build into the house.

01:04:03:08 - 01:04:05:09
Ken Nelson: So it's it's all good.

01:04:05:11 - 01:04:22:08
Curtis Lawson: Yeah. We're we're in the floodplain, here in Houston, a lot of hurricanes and that kind of thing. So, we're required to build the houses up out of the floodplain a certain number of inches. And so this house is built on a I think it's four foot, finish floor.

01:04:22:08 - 01:04:24:05
Ken Nelson: If I remember right. Yeah. It was a four foot brick.

01:04:24:05 - 01:04:40:23
Curtis Lawson: Four feet off the ground. So we have a pretty good crawlspace under the house. And so that was sealed with a closed cell phone. So and we have, a stereo, vapor barrier on the ground with gravel. So it's, it's similar to doing a radon mitigation system, essentially.

01:04:40:25 - 01:04:57:05
Mike Collignon: Okay. Awesome. Well, I don't see any other questions, John. So I am, going to go ahead and wrap it up. And thank you so much for taking the time to be with us today. Share this information. Get after the audience, ask questions. We really do appreciate it.

01:04:57:08 - 01:04:57:23
Curtis Lawson: Thank you.

01:04:57:27 - 01:05:17:21
Mike Collignon: Thank you Mike. Thank you. Sarah. Mary, I appreciate your time today. Yeah, yeah. Thanks to the audience again. Thank you to Panasonic for their generous sponsorship of this webinar. You know, our next webinar is going to be in just two weeks. That's on April 1st, and that's no joke. We'll be back with another housing 2.0 webinar featuring Sam Raskin.

01:05:17:24 - 01:05:33:03
Mike Collignon: And I might be there, too. We'll be talking about the disconnect between offsite construction and affordability. We're going to get started on our whole time with 2 p.m. eastern. Until next time, enjoy the beginning of March Madness this weekend and stay safe. Stay healthy and take care everyone. So long today.