Smart Home Demonstrates the Value of Efficient Building Products

By Cass Jacoby.  

The Living Lab shows us how products like VYCOR® enV-S™ help make homes more efficient and prove their place in sustainable home construction of the future. 

Anyone driving down the street and looking at the construction of this house wouldn’t recognize anything too different about it. The Living Lab looks like other homes on the street but is actually a study in sustainable living. Tech expert Peggy Smedley and her husband David are conducting research leveraging leading-edge construction technology to build a home that uses more sustainable and efficient residential homebuilding practices. 

Connected World reports that this project seeks to incorporate the most advanced products and systems from leading manufacturers and technology companies to educate both the industry and consumers on how we can create sustainable homes and communities in the future.  

So, what’s really going on under the roof of the Living Lab? With construction well under way, the “From the Ground Up: Project Sustainability Living Lab” home is focused     on using the most innovative and efficient building materials, like GCP’s Vycor® enV-S™, which is a self-adhering weather resistive barrier that provides an advanced alternative to house wraps. By utilizing this innovative building material, the Living Lab is ultimately able to achieve a more energy-efficient house. This membrane is highly durable and directly adheres to the sheathing, avoiding tearing or reworks that can come with traditional house wraps. 

Vycor® enV-S™ promotes energy efficiency by creating an airtight yet breathable home. Mechanical fasteners are not required for this membrane, yet it is able to form a water and airtight seal around the fasteners used to install siding and exterior finishing materials. Because this advanced weather barrier adheres to itself, it improves the protection at the laps that are particularly vulnerable points for air and water leaks with traditional house wraps.  

This membrane is just the beginning of the innovative solutions that are being leveraged on the Living Lab project, a shining example that demonstrates how we can live in a greener and cleaner future without sacrificing a high-performing home. 

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Photo credit: Connected World 

About Cass  

Cass works as a reporter/writer for RoofersCoffeeShop, AskARoofer and MetalCoffeeShop. When she isn’t writing about roofs, she is putting her Master degree to work writing about movies and dancing with her plants.