Michael Holigan: When you're looking for windows for you home, you're gonna get hit with all kinds of terms, argon gas, krypton gas, Low E windows. All you really want is an energy-efficient window that makes for a comfortable house. Steve Easley's going to help us today. Steve, how do we find the right window for our home?
Steve Easley: Well Michael, there have been some tremendous improvements in window technologies over the last few years and manufacturers have been very busy making some really significant improvements in windows that's going to make your home more comfortable and your energy bill's a lot lower. The great thing is, is that there's been a council formed called the National Fenestration Rating Council and that council is made up of builders, utility people, window manufacturers, and they've all got together and decided a way to really provide an energy guide rating for windows. And the purpose behind this is to really develop a label to help consumers select windows. And the really neat thing about this label is, is that it really provides the consumer with a rating of how well the window performs so that you measuring the entire window, the frame, the glass.
M.H.: So it's just like an R rating for insulation, but this is for windows, so it's a U factor?
S.E.: Right. The U factor might seem a bit confusing, but it's actually the opposite of R value. And so what we want in a window is the window with the lowest U value. U value means it's a measure of the window's ability to conduct heat. Well, we want of course a window that doesn't conduct much heat, and so therefore, we're looking for a product that has the lowest U value. And this label is great because what this label does, is it takes all the guesswork out of buying a window. This is a device that can measure the amount of heat that gets through glass and it also does a good job of measuring the amount of daylight that comes through. So let's take a sample of glass. This is like a double-pane window, just two layers of clear glass and we put this in the beam splitter and you can see that almost 20% of the daylight is blocked from getting through and almost 60% of the heat is getting through a standard double-pane window. Now, in the old days, when we wanted to control cooling load, particularly more commercial buildings, but we use to use products like this, really dark colored glass. Now, while the dark colored glass does a good job of blocking the heat and over 75%, it also blocks over 85% of the natural daylight. So, that's really probably not a good choice for most people's homes, because as you can see it blocks out most of the visible light and we'd have to turn on an electric lights and so forth, to be able to see inside of our home during the daytime and that wouldn't be too good. Manufacturers have come up with some neat new Low E technology. And this is a product that has multiple Low E coatings and if you'll look at this, you can see that it blocks out almost 85% of all the heat, but lets in nearly 69% of the visible light that we need to see with.
M.H.: Steve, how much difference can the glass have on the utility bill?
S.E.: Well, windows can account for up to 25% of your heating costs in the winter time, and up to 40% of your cooling bill in the summer. So it really makes sense to consider windows for both heating and cooling climates, particularly if you have air conditioning.
M.H.: It's a good place to invest your money on the right choice.
Episode 32 1996 - 97 Season
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