Noise, Particulates, and the Lawsuit Nobody Saw Coming

Well, look at that. You turn around twice and it's time for another Wise Home Energy Show here on the Voice of Liberty,

WYSL and WLEA. Pure energy. And we got the host for the most here, Jeff Flaherty from Wise Home Energy. Bob, always great to be back in the hot seat facing, uh, across the table from the legend. Look at that. I see what you did there, the hot seat. That's what everybody's thinking about right now. Am I gonna be hot? Uh, what if, what if I'm hot in my home? Yeah, absolutely. Uh, one of the things, we're in that. kind of shoulder season where you don't know if it's gonna be 40 or 80. It, it- And it' might be that in the same day, right? It probably... Yeah. Yeah. Oh, that's good stuff. It's funny, people sometimes don't think of that heat coming and, uh, they do when they turn on their air conditioning and, and nothing seems to work. Or it's not, it's blowing, but it's blowing warm air. Mm.

So always get ahead of it. Yeah. It's tough to be prepared, right? And, uh, uh, I always think of, they sell these emergency gas cans that you put in the back of your car in case you run out of gas. Mm-hmm. And I always thought, "Is the person who's gonna run out of gas gonna be the one who's so prepared that they put an emergency gallon in the back of their trunk?" It just doesn't seem like that's a mix. I don't know. You can have a great big box of, uh, cold air. Yeah. You know, the emergency cold air. That's- You open it up when it, uh, the AC doesn't work. That's a good idea. I like that, definitely. So, I don't think it works that way. But anyway. We, uh, you know, I should note, uh, I did see in the news that, uh,

RG&E, and it's probably NYSEG, is gonna have an $11 a month hike if you have, uh, both electric and gas. Mm. So, uh, that's, uh, man, I'm not good at math. What is that? 132 or something like that.

But you're, uh, uh, you know, we'll probably start getting calls that people's bills are going up. Well, that's just the cost of, uh, hooking up the, the meter to your home and what you're gonna pay each month. So that's a, that's a three-year... Uh, the, the article said it was a three-year, uh, staged event. Yeah. So I don't know if that's the second year or third year, and, uh, things, things keep going up, right? And of, and of course they never go down. You no- notice nobody... They never announce, "And we're gonna reduce your price."

Yeah. No. I know. It, it, it is an interesting thing. We, uh, we had an interesting home recently where, uh, you get homes over by airports, and airports, um, create some noise on those f- on those landing and takeoff patterns. And, uh, a client called and said that they wanted to, um, get rid of the noise. It was really bugging them. And- Wait a minute.

I'm, I'm... This does not compute. Why would they call Wise Home Energy about noise from aircraft? Well, that is, you know, that's a great question, and I'm glad they did call us because, um, some of the things we do really attenuate sound. So sound, uh, transfers, you probably know better than me, but through the air. So air leakage in the home can be, uh, a source of, uh, annoying noises.

So it goes so far as that, uh, some years ago it was such a big deal all across the nation, that if you were in these flight patterns, uh, these government entities that own these, uh, airports would pay, uh, to have these homes insulated to help, uh, muffle the sound basically. Interesting.

And you guys do that? Yeah, we do. And so we came out to the home, and she had just, uh, about a year and a half ago, had some, uh, insulation work done through a program. And we climbed up in the attic, and we saw that it was...

It's tough. Should I... I don't know if I should be saying it was done wrong. Well, I looked at the contract. It wasn't done according to the contract. I know that much. My-- in my opinion, it was done wrong. We would've done it differently, and in my opinion, we would've done it better. But these are two-foot slope homes, so, uh, in some areas of the, uh, country or the state, we have colonials where they didn't really do soffits. So when... I don't know if they were saving on wood, but the gutter line is kind of right at the fascia. It's not two-foot, uh, hangover.

And there's these two-foot slopes in the second floor of the home, and they had opted to not insulate these. So the infrared camera, these were lit up. Uh, we could clearly see they weren't insulated. We could clearly see in the attic that they weren't insulated. And then we pull back a little of the cellulose, and we can see that the, the air sealing was not done.

And she was willing to show us, uh, the contract and, and it's w- it's well past a year, so you get into a little bit of will anybody make them go back and fix it?

Uh, but the blower door was, um, you know, maybe at a 2,100, uh, for that home. So we probably, had we had done the work, we would probably be at 16, 1,700. So that, that is part of the sound. So she really called us for wall insulation. And so the wall insulation would, uh, help attenuate the sound. And then if you have, uh, single-pane windows, upgrading to double-pane windows, uh, will, will, uh, help, uh, knock that sound down. But it, it's really interesting that we come out to these homes and I was able to dig into the contractor.

Um, he was, uh, not, not from the city of Rochester, about 40 minutes out and, and had a great HVAC website. He was an HVAC contractor who found that, "Oh, I should get into these programs, uh, so I can go out and sell this work." And, uh, and actually he must be doing very well because when you charge the program a lot of money to air seal, and then you don't do the air sealing, um, I think that's like 100% profit.

So you have no material cost, and you have no labor cost. So, uh, I would love that, but ethically, I, I just wouldn't be able to sleep at night knowing I did that to a program or to a person. Uh, so it's disappointing, but one of the other things that happened at that home was we do an indoor air quality test. And it's just a 30-minute test. It's no cost as part of our energy assessment, and it, it flagged some things. We just send the report on, and we, we show them, "This is what it showed." So, uh, it had high particulate matter, and she was, uh, very concerned about this- Hmm ... because she had, um, a, um, a degree in particulate matter and the harmful effects it does on the body. And she called me and said, you know, "I wanna look at more testing," and

I gave her some, uh, an option for us to do some more testing. And she-- and I said, "Here's some ways that you can, uh, help, uh, remediate this." And she said, "Well,

I..." Uh, uh, kind of manage it, the, the actual particulate matter, filtrate it out, and she said, "Well, I don't wanna, I don't wanna, you know, do a cure. I wanna find the source.

What's the source?" I said, "Well, we just, we just ran the test. I'm not in the home. We don't know if it's outdoors or indoors." You get it from d- diesel engines. You could- You get a lot from exhaust ... yeah, you could get it from pollen, you could get it from, uh, you know... I said, "Do you burn candles?" And there was a little hesitation and, and, "Not often." So I don't know what ot- not often means. Not often can mean a lot of things. But it was, you know, it was interesting. It got her thinking and, and I hope, uh, I'm able to follow up with her and, and, uh, learn, you know, what her concerns were, what her... if she wants to move forward with us with a remediation plan. But we, we don't know the source. It, it did not appear to be, uh, the combustion equipment.

She had, uh, a hybrid electric hot water tank, so it wouldn't be that. Um, the furnace was direct vented outside. So it's, it's some other source. But you can get it from just burning toast. I asked, you know, what she had for breakfast that morning and, uh, so it, it, it can be these little things, and a 30-minute test isn't enough to tell us, you know, long term what we have. But, uh, I'm,

I'm really interested to hear, uh, what her, uh, path is and, and, and hopefully I'll update our listeners on, on how that goes. But- Yeah, I'd be interested to hear about that. So do you forensically get into that then and try to, and try to troubleshoot and find out what the source of the particulates is? We would need to run a longer term test, and we would really need the, the client to tell us what they're doing. You know, um, are your windows open? Are your windows closed? So how leaky the home is.

It, uh, air is gonna come in from outside and then what you're doing. Um, so, uh, cleaning particles, uh, just coming in and out. Maybe if you have, uh, a lot of pets that are in and out and, and tracking in pollen and things like that. So there's all these little different sources, and you'll see this kinda spike up and down.

Looks, the graph looks similar to a, a stock market, as we've seen go up and down. So- Goes up and down. So, uh, now does this, does this track along... We're talking about noise abatement. This is a completely separate issue now, right? Yeah. It's a, it's a separate issue, but it's something that we, uh, we can do, and we, we certainly call it sound attenuation. We don't call it soundproofing. Uh, we're really just trying to stop that, uh, frequency from coming in. Uh, and, and, you know, some of it can be as simple as, oh, their windows, they're single pane.

Hey, maybe I don't wanna, maybe I don't wanna replace that window. Maybe that's a historic window. There's, there's some options there for some retrofit, uh, interior storms, things of that nature. So, so finding the source, uh, or the transmission, uh, path is, is a little trickier. Uh, but from interior to exterior, tightening up that home, uh, those are some of the benefits we hear after we treat a home. "Hey, it's quieter out there." Uh, in, in fact,

I recall a story some 10 years ago where, uh, I have a very colorful, uh, uh, insulation, uh, foreman who was working in the city and heard a gunshot, and we were dense packing the exterior walls. And he came in and said, "Do you get a lot of those gunshots around here?" And the client said, "Yes." And he said- Wow ... "Well, this insulation's gonna really tamp down that noise." Oh my gosh. And I was thinking that's a phenomenal benefit, but I think as a society, we would just like less gunshots- Yeah ... in, in, uh, uh- I'm thinking ... areas like that. Yeah. They should be out in the woods, I think, farther away. So- So when you say you dense pack, what, what, uh, what do you do, uh, what, what's the material that you use to- So we, uh, typically use, uh, cellulose. Uh, so, uh, that is a ground-up newspaper.

Uh, I will be fully honest that I don't know how long that material will be around with the shrinking of the newspaper circulation. Uh, so uh, less and less, right? Uh, so it's ground up, uh, treated with a naturally occurring fire retardant, and then when it's put in the walls, it's put in under, uh, a high pressure, uh, blower w- with, uh, um, two blowers our system has, and we check the density. And so really there's kind of this myth, because it's been around for 40,

50 years, that the product settles. So the product does settle when it's installed improperly. So we... They used to install it with inferior, uh, blowing machines that, um, the maintenance wasn't done. There was no tests. We now can test the pressure. The machine we have has gauges on the side of it. We cover the, the hose to, to capture, uh, and, and record the reading of the pressure.

And then we're drilling holes, and the old system was to face fill until it came out the second hole up top. So it was really... And it had to use all that pressure to get up eight feet.

Now, we drill the hole, fish a hose four foot down, we're about the middle of the wall, uh, fill it till the material stops, then pull the hose back a foot, the material stops.

And when we're done, the cellulose is like a firm mattress. So, uh, if you have a home and you go to remodel it and you remove the interior wall, the cellulose, if you're not ... tearing it apart with claw hammers, the cellulose will stay right in place. And that's- Interesting ... that's how we know. And some years ago, uh, well, it's been about seven, eight years ago, a guy called me, uh, and said, uh, "You just insulated my home. I had a fire."

And, uh, you know, so there's a little heart, heart palpitation when I hear that. Uh, but, uh, he said, uh, you know, like, uh, the client, it was a, a two-family rental property, and the client was, um, uh, cooking and left something on the stove, and a fire started. And he goes, "I want you to re-insulate it." And, uh, so I came over and the, and, uh, insulation, the walls were down, but the insulation was still, uh, firm in the walls. And I, you know, I was able to take some pictures and say, "This is what a good quality dense pack, uh, wall looks like." That's fantastic. Yeah. It was pretty neat. And, uh, and it, one of the things it does when it, um, when it's in balloon frame walls is it really stops that, uh, stack effect for a fire. So if you get a fire, uh, I remember some years ago I had a friend, uh, who had a friend in Buffalo who, um, it was like a three-floor home, and the fire started on the first floor, busted through the walls, and raced up the walls- Yeah ... and started into the third floor. But you also, you also get a, uh, a chimney effect where the air- Yes ... uh, uh, draws the fire upwards. Yes. Uh, and yeah, not a good thing. So yeah, that is definitely one of the things we offer. Many people think it can't be done. Um, people call up, um, you know, and they want their, they want their walls, uh, insulated and it, and it's a three-year-old home. And I say, "Well, t- according to code, that, that, that is, uh, already insulated." "Well, this room's uncomfortable." And, and then we go to the, we go to the blower door test and, and we, we try to explain that, um, let us do our assessment.

Uh, you tell us what's wrong, and then we'll figure out what the facts show. Uh, but sometimes people call us up with they already have the solution, and, uh, there's... Y- you can't put 10 pounds, uh, in a five-pound bag, so- Right, right, right ... we, we, we don't do anything like that.

Um, so those are, those are interesting. I hope, uh, I hope to get a, uh, a good report on how that home comes out from a sound issue, uh, and from a particular matters. Particulars. This would be a good, uh, uh, opportunity right now, a good juncture for us to tell everybody who you are and what your company's all about. Sure. So Jeff Flaherty.

Uh, I started Wise Home Energy 15 years ago. This is our 15-year anniversary, and we, uh, really are experts in fixing uncomfortable, unhealthy homes. Uh, so energy efficiency is one part of it. We use energy efficiency, uh, grants, no-cost assessments that everybody in New York is eligible for to diagnose the home and then look for the appropriate rebates that match what the home needs. So it's l- feels a little different than what other companies are advertising the rebates, slam them in, and, uh, it doesn't fix the problems. And then, then we get the calls afterwards.

And, uh, so, uh, we have a, a simple process. Uh, we start out with a 15-minute phone call, figure out what your goals are, and, uh, schedule up the assessment. Takes a little bit of paperwork. Uh, come out to the home. Average size home takes about two hours. Uh, climb into areas of the home that, uh, many people don't go into. Uh, we go into the attics and crawl spaces, and we're looking, we're, we're thinking and examining and diagnosing areas that you don't even think exist. So your walls, um, are, uh, depending on the age of the home, are interconnected to the ceiling of the first floor, then to the outdoors.

Uh, all that stuff is kind of interconnected and plays into our, our comfort and our energy efficiency and, and the healthy, uh, environment we live in.

So, uh, it's an easy process. You just call or text us at 585-270-5836, and we'll walk you through the process. And nobody wants to be sold. Uh, somebody called the other day and, and we kind of... They wanted an attic estimate, and, uh, it was kind of a, you know, husband and wives have some interesting partnerships. Some call to schedule it for the other partner, and that's what happened here, and I got the, the call that said,

"Well, they, they just want an estimate," and call this person. And so I called them and I said, I said, "I understand you don't want the audit." "Yeah. No, no, we don't, we don't want anything with windows and doors." And, and it's, I kind of chuckle because I don't want anything with windows and doors either.

It is so far down the list of what you would need to correct to solve your problem. And so this, this particular gentleman was calling for an ice issue.

Um, so, so I'm gonna go out to the home and do the estimate, but I presume he wants to pay $2,000 more because the rebate I'm gonna get him requires the assessment. So what'll happen is I'll give him the prices and say, "If you wanna pay $2,000 less, you can reschedule with me at a later date, and I'll come out and do the assessment." And, uh- Why wouldn't he do it? Yeah. Why wouldn't he? And so he just, he... It s- it sounds like we're trying to sell people on something. We're not. We're trying to offer solutions. So- Well, I think it's important to, to note here.

I mean, you know, the, the, the traditional, uh, w- point of reference, uh, if you're uncomfortable in your home, you know, you're hot in the summer, humid, you're, you're chilly in the winter, uh, you just can't get warm no matter what- how the, uh, thermostat is set, uh, the place feels uncomfortable for whatever reason, is, well, you know, maybe we need a new air conditioner.

Maybe we need... Not necessarily. Maybe we need a new furnace. No, a bigger one. No, not necessarily. Yeah. Maybe we need to redo the, the, you know, the windows and doors are old. Maybe we need to replace them. Not necessarily.

This is a systemic approach. Mm-hmm. And it's an informed one. And what's gonna happen if you call an HVAC guy? They sell HVAC.

So they're gonna say what you want is this wonderful new XTR 4000, uh, and it's, you know, bigger capacity. Yeah. Which is as, as you've noted on this show, Jeff, nu- numerous times, uh, sometimes it's counterproductive.

It is. More capacity can make your problem worse. It is. You don't think that. And may- maybe it's, uh, you know, they, they, they're, they're thinking, "Well, we just need to get the roof redone in a certain way." Yeah. Well, that could be, but not necessarily.

Yeah. I mean, you know, no- nobody likes a complex, uh, issue, especially if you have a predisposed notion of what you think needs to be done. Yeah. But Wise Home Energy is just that. Literally, their name says it all. It's a wise approach to why you're uncomfortable in your home for whatever reason. Give them the phone number. It's 585-270-5836.

And, you know, really, uh, following along those lines, Bob, I... there's two interesting points that I've, I've stumbled on over the past week.

Um, one is I had a client, uh, uh, uh, call in and say, "I want an energy audit. I have a very uncomfortable home and, uh, my, my heating, uh, uh, professional who services my furnace says that, you know, I should get an energy audit."

And I looked up the home, and we had serviced the home six years ago, and the home was in really great shape. And I quickly realized this is a new owner, the equipment is oversized, and her issue is, um, h- really high, high humidity. So what that is a combination of typically is there's either air coming in from outside, uh, or the equipment is oversized and it's not running long enough to dehumidify. So my options for her are going to be to rightsize the equipment or to install a whole house dehumidifier. Uh, she already has an HVAC contractor, so my prices are, you know, gonna be pretty similar, maybe less, uh, we're gonna solve the problem. We might actually be downsizing her, her, uh, HVAC. If she elects to go that way. Yeah, yeah. It's, it's really- Counterintuitive, but- It's really interesting. And on another note,

I just read... Now, I was on a, uh, a social media account, so I... that could be, that could be totally fake, but it was an attorney who said, uh, he had received 10 calls recently about clients who had oversized equipment instal- installed in their home, and he was out of Virginia.

And he was getting ready to bring some cases against some very large private equity companies, uh, because they did not properly size the equipment. And so I didn't... it didn't really detail whether this is, um, uh, brand new built homes or if they're retrofits, uh, but it's... this is definitely a thing. And, uh, so I tried to research the person's name to see if I could see anything about it. And, you know, what'll happen is, um, y- usually I don't like these type of lawsuits because, you know, you sue the cable company and then we get a postcard and we get 21 cents, uh, check mailed to us and the, and the attorneys get rich, but I don't know if policies change. But, uh, but if we can get people to start, uh, you know, thinking of this. The professional... the average homeowner doesn't have this knowledge.

The salesman who comes in is either a salesman or is a person who didn't wanna install equipment anymore. So he looks around and sizes it off the old equipment. You know, he's, he's, he's good at talking and he gets out the paper and,

"Mrs. Jones, we got some financing for you, and here, put this in." And then no one really knows that it was done wrong, um, until the pipes are dripping in the basement or the thing is on and off. But really what this lawsuit or, or what is going on is that new equipment has high efficiency blower motors that'll ramp up, uh, based on the, the pressure. If there's too much pressure in the system, the duct work is not the right size, it ramps up and it kills the motor prematurely. So you're st- swapping out these very expensive blower motors, and you swap out the first one, and sooner or later you swap, swap out the second one.

And, uh, y- uh, who nobody ever realizes it was, it was a fait accompli, it was a dead system the moment it was installed because it wasn't matched up to the duct work. So I am thrilled, uh, that I will not be part of that lawsuit because- I'll bet ... we install the right size equipment, and when we don't, it's because we can't find anything smaller for the home. So we only we can only sell the smallest piece of equipment we can find, and that's what we install.

So, uh, that, that's really interesting. One... Some years ago, I went to a home, and I sort of love to look at the home and see what the home tells me. And on the floor was, like, a new blower motor.

And, uh- You mean just, like, laying there uninstalled? I shouldn't say new. It was old. It was laying there, and there was a new one, and it was all... It was through a grant program, and it was all jammed up. Uh, the blower, the furnace wasn't working properly, the customer had complaints and, and it was c- incredibly dark basement. It was a rental property. And there above was the return that is panned off, and it's just ripped out of the ceiling, and then we find dense pack cellulose in it. So when you dense pack a, a wall on a, on an older 1900s, 1920s built home, the returns, there's an inspection process we go through, and the returns can be... most times are panned off, and if you're not paying attention outside, you fill it and you fill the return. Now you've just put duct tape over your mouth and you, you cannot breathe in. Oh, geez. So the furnace wasn't breathing The blower died, they replaced the blower. Probably soon afterwards, attic started struggling, and somebody finally realized instead of calling back the insulation company to fix their problem, they just ripped the return down. So now the return is pulling from the dirty basement. Ew.

It's... And it's just, it- it's just not a scientific process. It's like, just, um, uh, I guess, cold patch on a street. You know, it's a short-term fix, and soon it's, you know, someday we're gonna have to look at, you know, really looking at the whole road and the, the foundation. And, and, and people think it's costlier than it, it's gonna be, and it's, it's not. It's really quite cost-effective to do it the right way the first time. Yeah, just do it, do it right, do it once.

Yeah, a- and, uh, another important thing here, too, is to make sure that whoever's doing work in your home knows what they're doing, for Pete's sake.

Uh, y- you know, these s- I get the sense that some of these guys are venturing into areas where they should not go. It sounds like it. We, we have our specialties.

Um, you know, if you, uh... So yesterday, uh, I went to a home, uh, that had, I think I mentioned it on the last show, it had cellulose on the floor of the attic and foam on the roof deck. And I, I just, I, like I said, I sort of kind of guessed the story.

Now, new owner, so we don't know anything about, but somebody comes in and says, "I got ice dams." Well, you got insulation on the floor. If the, if the person they called only has foam, you're probably getting a foam quote. Uh, you're not probably getting a- Yeah, exactly ... a quote to fix it. You're just getting a foam quote. So now- We're a foam company. It's like, uh, that's what we do. Yeah. Do you want foam, or do you want nothing? Yeah. So we, we foam, we do cellulose, we do air leakage diagnostics, we do heating and cooling, we do indoor air quality, uh, testing and remediation, and if it's something we don't do, we will say,

"We don't do that. This might be a good phone number," if we know of one that we can confidently refer. So we wanna do what we're really good at. And, uh, it is not costlier to do it the right way, and it's no cost to get the diagnosis. So, uh, it- it's as, it's as easy as, uh, 585-270-5836.

There's no tense, uh, sitting at the kitchen table with, uh, "Now, how much can you afford?" Yep. Uh, what, what payment are you looking for? That's, uh, not the way you guys fly. No. It's, uh, we go back to the office. It can take a while to work it up. We work it up. We s- we really wanna find out the rebates first. So we, a lot of times we're getting calls, uh, somebody was here two, three weeks ago, and we're, "Hey, we, we wanna do this right. We don't wanna do this fast."

So. Gotcha. And you are taking appointments now? Yeah, 585-270-5836. And that's you guys in Hornell as well, Hornell, Wellsville, Bath, down there in the Southern Tier. Uh, you have been listening to the Wise Home Energy Show, a presentation of Wise

Home Energy. Uh, your host and, uh, the president of Wise Home Energy, Jeff Flaherty. Thanks so much for listening. Get the podcast, by the way, at wysl1040.com, and we'll see you next time right here on The Voice of Liberty.