Typically, sealing a home involves a technician searching for cracks and filling them by hand. It’s a time-consuming and costly process. There’s a hidden scourge making homes more harmful to the climate and less comfortable: leaky heating and cooling systems. Plugging those leaks may be the dull stepchild of the energy transition, but that doesn’t make it any less important than installing dazzling solar arrays and getting millions of electric vehicles on the road.
Aeroseal, a company whose technology was developed in conjunction with Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, has an ingenious solution. Its computer-tracked system finds and targets leaks, including even those behind walls, and then releases an aerosolized sealant to fill them.Typically, sealing a home involves a technician searching for cracks and filling them by hand. It’s a time-consuming and costly process. Aeroseal’s technology makes the hunt for leaks easier.
The non-toxic, water-based sealant coagulates on contact with the edge of the crack and forms a new barrier. Technicians monitor the leakage rates in real time on a computer. For an average-sized residence, the whole process can take 60 minutes and cut leakage by about 80%, the company says.But it is not just new homes that Aeroseal tackles. Ductwork in older homes is a major energy efficiency issue.
For existing buildings, including single-family homes and commercial buildings, Aeroseal can narrow the process so that technicians focus on ducts alone instead of sealing the whole building. The first step is to block all the known vents in the system and detach the boiler. Technicians then attach a tube to the vent system and hook up the computerized measurement machine, allowing them to do the pressurization. This process can reduce leakage by 95%, the company says.