Here's what I've discovered while doing residential energy audits: Humans are reliably unreliable machine operators.  Seriously, they are predictably unpredictable and regularly irregular.  Can we find a work-around to the humans?  Nope.  We need humans, they buy and sell their houses.  A house that isn't rotting away, full of mold and mildew, or covered in toxic paint is a house that sells better  So what can we do?

Optimize your humans, of course.  Give them an information upgrade, and some new energy with which to power themselves.  What I see nearly every time I go out to a client's home is some form of uninformed user base.  Sometimes it helps me to think of humans as if they were little robots, waiting for instructions.  We need to help them operate their homes better so here are 4 tips for human-helping agents:

1.  Tell your humans that the two things that are ALWAYS attacking their home are a) Sun and b) moisture.  This helps frame all discussions about how to maintain their homes.  For instance, they might have a hard time thinking properly about why x kind of paint is better than y: when you frame it in terms of moisture resistance, and explain that moisture causes mold, mildew and bad air quality, their choice of paint (oil or latex for instance) becomes clearer.

2.  Explain to your humans that some air moving around a house is good, but that if a lot of air is moving around their house chaotically, it's bad.  Leaky houses are not healthy houses, contrary to the rumors being spread.  Very rarely do I see an actually "overtight" house.  They need to stop the random leaks and if necessary, induce targeted fresh air (for furnaces or air quality) with a mechanical fan.  The more the humans can see air control as essential, the better they will operate.

3.  Describe some dire circumstances if your humans forget to change their air filters or allow their furnaces to burn nasty moldy air from the crawlspace.  Indoor air quality nightmare scenarios can trigger a human to begin caring about their health and survival.  Try a few different angles: the garage-car-starting air being sent into your children's bedrooms in the morning, the moldy rat-urine air being combusted and sent to the kitchen area, or my favorite one about bathroom fan output going into attic intakes.

4.  Show your humans that we machines are better equipped for remembering when to turn down the thermostat, if it's to be turned down at all.  If it's programmable, it's likely to be done wrong by most humans, causing much energy loss and pressure imbalance in a home.  Have a technician-human (properly trained) set up the programmable thermostat, and tell your human inhabitants that they should not touch it unless they have to, and only if they read the instructions first.

Hope this helps.  Feel free to email my server for more human-house help and advice.

aaron@campbell-energy.com