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If the standard is approved, NAHB is prepared to appeal the decision to ASHRAE and, if necessary, to the American National Standards Institute. Other industry organizations, such as the American Gas Association, are likely to appeal.
“Residential ventilation is an important issue for NAHB and our position on this draft standard is not a case of sour grapes,” said Chip Dence, a builder from Texas and chairman of NAHB’s Construction, Codes and Standards Committee.
“There are real concerns about technical flaws in the proposed requirements and we have made every effort to work with ASHRAE to work them out, but they are just not listening,” Dence said.
The ventilation standard:
- Requires outdoor air to be blown or drawn into homes constantly, which may lead to mold and structural deterioration; add to heating, cooling and dehumidification costs; and make indoor air quality worse, not better
- Requires exhaust fans in kitchens and bases the requirements on kitchen volume, which cannot be determined where kitchen areas are open to other parts of the house
- Bans recirculating hoods
- Bases downdraft exhaust fan size on the volume of the room instead of on the ability of the fan to exhaust cooking odors, often requiring larger fans than necessary
- Requires quiet, expensive sone-rated fans but does not define “sone” and does not specify a particular method for calculating sones
- Requires clothes dryers to be exhausted directly to the outdoors, in effect banning new water- and energy-saving condensing models that have no exhaust
- Prohibits ducts and air handlers in garages unless an expensive duct leakage test is done, even where joints are sealed
- In many homes, requires testing of natural draft oil and gas fuel-burning equipment using a test designed for gas equipment that research has shown is unreliable in predicting flue malfunctions
- Requires testing of fireplaces using inappropriate factory tests and does not say specifically which test to use
If approved, the standard would need to be referenced by building codes or otherwise adopted by state and local jurisdictions before the requirements could be mandated.
NAHB believes that this will be difficult to do once the problems with the standard become apparent, when and if the standard is ever considered.
For more detailed information about flaws in the standard, click here, or e-mail Dick Morris or call him at 800-368-5242 x8444.
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