# Colorado Green Remodel



## Dinggus (Jul 22, 2010)

I've never seen a house like this, looks awesome!


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## Msradell (Sep 1, 2011)

Just wondering what do you get by getting LEED certification? Will you get any savings that will offset your costs or is it just one of those nice to have kind of thing?


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## EMD360 (Jun 15, 2012)

I don't get much, except a certificate. If I were to sell the house, the multiple listings now have a category for LEED certification but I don't intend to sell in the near future so my current LEED cert would most likely be superceded in the future.
I mostly signed up to update my knowledge about green building techniques and to learn from the green building group in the Denver area. I took the training to become a green rater and would like to work with younger folks who are interested in building better insulated and more sustainable houses.


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## EMD360 (Jun 15, 2012)

Dinggus said:


> I've never seen a house like this, looks awesome!


Thanks, that is what we thought when we bought it. Just needs a lot of interior updating and some exterior. Tearing it apart has been fun. I found that the east wall is 2 x 6" with 1" of celotex thermax insulation (Polyisocyanurate-foil-faced) on the outside and a plastic vapor barrier on the inside. Even at 30 years old--Polyisocyanurate loses value over time, that is about an R25 wall. Not bad for the 80's.
I'm planning to improve this though. Need to have a thermal break in the wall. (Learned this from the LEED training.) So I'm thinking an extruded polystyrene inner layer to increase the wall to R30. Still in the planning stages though.


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## EMD360 (Jun 15, 2012)

*November Update*

Have been working steadily on the house all summer and fall. Tore out all the interior walls on the slab area of the house and took out all the mechanicals. 









Hired a contractor to take out the old slab and dig out the dirt to allow for a Waffle Mat system under the new slab. It uses recycled plastic boxes to allow for soil lift and create heavy beams running cross ways through the slab, just like a commercial foundation. 
We found out the rear wall is a caisson foundation, which I had never heard of, but it is deeply drilled reinforced concrete columns (they say to bedrock) that are filled in with poured concrete walls over a cardboard void that keeps the soil from damaging the wall. The cardboard was rotted and the soil pushed up in between the columns so it was dug out and will be a void again.










The soil against the back wall was wet so it could be that the french drain is not working, so we are going to put one inside the wall too.
We pulled a permit for the plumbing rough in so that is the next step. Also have the floor plan pretty much figured out for the rebuild.









Would LOVE to have the new floor in by the end of the year. That would be one full year of work and progress. We have until next September or so to move in. But there is a lot more to do!


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