Our Kitchen Before and After

Well it has taken almost 10 months since we first started working on the kitchen and there are still a few details left to clean up (window coverings, seat cushion, baseboards) but in our minds the kitchen in complete.

The "Green" features of our kitchen:

- No and low VOC paint
- Low VOC sealants
- Formaldehyde free cabinets made from FSC wood
- Zodiaq Recycled glass countertop
- Cork flooring
- R-24 Insulation and full air/vapour barrier
- Energy star appliances
- LED under-cabinet lights
- Recycled MDF, low VOC window trim
- Electronic charge station with dedicated switch
- 95% of demolition and construction waste diverted from the landfill

What is was:

Our new kitchen (although I am not too happy with the pictures. There always seemed to be too much contrast):

View from Family Room

View from Dining Room

Pantry Unit

Desk and Banquette

LED Lights in Action

Next up... the bathrooms.

New Zodiaq Counters

It has been a while since our temporary counters went up ... over 6 months.  Probably a little longer than normal but that does include our new baby renovation hiatus.

But a big part of the problem came from the fact that we knew what we wanted and we thought we knew where to get it.  Last year at the Montreal Home Show I saw a locally made recycled glass countertop.  It was beautiful and functional, 90% recycled content and locally sourced.  The company was Eco-Surface.  Their quote was good but their colour selection left a little to be desired.   The good news was they were expanding and in 100 days would be able to provide us a much better palette to pick from.

So we put up our temporary counters and waited.  Towards the 100 day mark we contacted them again to find their website directed us to: "Creations di Verre cite".  Alright, name change with expansion  ... no problem.   But there was a problem:  nobody would pick up the phone, or respond to an email, or website inquiries.   Heck their contact information on their website just provides their website address.

Chalked that up as a lost cause and headed back to square one.  Looking for alternatives there were several options although none of them local:

- EnviroGlas EnviroSLAB
- IceStone
- Geos Sustainable Surfaces from Eos
- Zodiaq Terra Collection from Dupont

Out of these group, IceStone probably gets kudos for being the greenest of all the products.  100% recycled glass in concrete, No VOC, no resins, no petrochemicals.  The company is very forward thinking and the entire process has received Gold Cradle to Cradle certification.  That being said it is concrete and therefore susceptible to etching and staining.  Properly sealed and cared for this shouldn't be a problem but for us relying on "proper maintenance and care" is setting ourselves up.  While we didn't go with it in the kitchen, we are strongly looking at it for the bathrooms.

Geos, was recommended but we struggled with finding the right colour. They also were unable to confirm their recycled content.   For the countertop to qualify for LEED points it needs to be a minimum of 25% post-consumer recycled content (post-industrial counts at 50%).  Geos could not confirm or guarantee that.

EnviroGlas was a little too bold a palette for us (and there were no local distributors) so we went with Zodiaq.  Zodiaq countertops are a recycled glass and quartz blend embedded in a resin.  Very hard, very durable, low maintenance and we found the perfect colour.  Custom cut and installed by Comptoir St-Denis, we are very pleased with the result.

The one danger of using recycled glass in any countertop or product is colour control.  While it may seem easy to separate out the brown beer bottle from the green wine bottles and clear soda bottles,  all you need is one little chip of green glass to potentially ruin an all white counter.  Our colour "Coriander" contains clear and brown glass with the occasional fleck of green.  But if you really hunt you can find a couple other odd colours.  We have one speck in an obscure corner that is florescent orange. Luckily, I only spot it when I am cleaning down the counter... so not very often at all :)

Ahhh, a working kitchen

Often during renovations, I find myself thinking about the 80s movie the "Money Pit".  There are little moments in it that capture the essence of renovating to me.  In particular this past week, I was remembering the scene where Tom Hanks finally had stairs and Shelley Long got her running water. They were ecstatic over the return of the simple conveniences that we take for granted every day.  We can relate.

17 weeks after we started deconstructing our kitchen and 15 after we lost the sink and the dishwasher... we have a functioning kitchen again.  After nearly 4 months of washing dishes in the bathtub the sound of running water in the kitchen was very exciting. Especially as the water was flowing out of the faucet and into the sink (trust me that is not always the case with plumbing projects).

You will have to forgive the short hiatus in the blog but the reality was between my day job, the renovations and preparing for our new baby (due at the end of the month) there just wasn't time.   I will go back and post details on what happened over the last three weeks but where we are today:

- Ceiling: vapour barrier, drywall, mudded and tapped and primed (will stipple later on)

- Walls: drywalled, mudded and tapped, primed and painted

- All electrical completed (except for microwave plug) and functional

I like the organic look of our temporary counters



- All plumbing completed and functional

- All appliances installed including new dishwasher

- Cabinets 70% installed - rest waiting on the counters

- Counters: using plywood counters temporarily,  To be honest the good-one-side FSC plywood with water based Varathane coating (low VOC) is proving to be a very functional (and green) $110 counter top.  And I generally like how it looks.  Probably some long term durability concerns though. When the permanent counter come in these will work wonderfully in my workshop.

- Flooring: sub-floor repaired and levelled and cork flooring installed

What's left: permanent counters, rest of the cabinets, window trim, baseboards, floor thresholds, heating ducts, hood fan, painting touch ups.





Approvals!

With the cabinets planning to be installed in the next week ,we are under the gun to have the kitchen ready. Having lost time to the fireplace, the last weeks have been pretty hectic.

Added to the regular workload was two procedural challenges. First, we had a non-structural wall that we were planning on knocking down. The city of Dollard-des-Ormeaux was willing to let us knock down anything that wasn't load bearing, but the oweness was on us to prove it wasn't a structural wall.

Once we had it all stripped down and could show that the 2x3 wall had no headers and was built parallel and between the ceiling joists it was an easy sell. The wall came down the same day.


The second step was LEED EA prereq 2.1: Insulation must be inspected by the green rater prior to the installation of drywall. Because the quality of the insulation and how it is installed is so critical to the overall project, they need to verify that there are not any issues. In particular they focus on ensuring the whole enevlope is sealed and insulated and there aren't any hidden gaps. It is this inspection where the fireplace would have been flagged.

But we passed with flying colours!! So we are on to drywalling.

Insulation: There is more than just the pink stuff

Insulation.... ahh the sexiest of home renovation topics. Alright, it can't compete with cabinets or flooring. Heck even faucets look exciting in comparison, but when it comes to a green renovation, insulation along with sealing your home envelope are the meat and potatoes.

With insulation, it all comes down to R-value. R-value is essentially the “Thermal Resistance” of a material. The higher the number the harder it is for heat to pass through. Seeing as this is the job of insulation, R-value along with price are usually the deciding factors in picking your insulation.

There was a period when fiberglass insulation was the beginning and the end of your home insulation choices. Nowadays, it is part of a subcategory. The list below is by no means exhaustive, but it covers what we felt were viable insulation options for our project. If you really want details there is a pretty good insulation guide put out by Natural Resources Canada.

Batt insulation: flexible insulation that fits between the wall studs. This includes traditional fiberglass but also the awesomeness of Roxul. Its easy to install and typically the least expensive.

Spray foam: A spray on insulation that provides not only some of the best insulating power per inch but also acts as an excellent air/vapor barrier. Can be expensive and for any significant job requires an outside contractor. Small jobs can be done by DIYers like we did behind the fireplace.

Rigid Insulation: Rigid foam panels. Again increased R-value and eliminates thermal bridging but can be expensive.

Now, if you didn’t catch it above, I am a fan of Roxul. So much so that it makes me wonder why you still see so much pink stuff in Home Depot’s aisles (Roxul is green). Roxul is made from stone wool: essentially rock and recycled slag spun into fibres. The result is a product that is:

• Easy to handle, cut and install


• Offers great R-value: R-14 vs. R-12 for fiberglass (although in writing this I have discovered both a new Roxul and new fibreglass rated to R-15)
  
• FIREPROOF! (it is rock after all, and I guess officially it is only fire-resistant as it will melt at 2200 degrees F)


• Made from 40% recycled material
  
• Minimal additives, no off-gassing, etc

But for our project we needed more than just Roxul. For LEED certification we needed a minimum of R-20. Since our exterior walls are 2X4 construction we identified three options to get us over R-20:

Option 1: Spray insulation between the studs: R-24.5
Option 2: Build up the wall 2” and use 2x6 Roxul: R-22
Option 3: Use Roxul in between the 2x4s and add 2” of rigid insulation: R-24

While they all seem to be in the same ball park performance wise, the R-values above are just for the insulation and do not account for a phenomenon called “Thermal Bridging” . Say you build a beautiful 2x4 wall and have it all nicely insulated with R-24.5 spray foam. That is great but the wood studs conduct heat too and they only have an R-rating of 4. So they act as a “bridge” for the heat to pass through. If you take this into consideration then the R-value for the wall is: 17.1 (I will not bore you with the equations). Looking at the R-values for the wall, the revised numbers become:

Option 1: R-17.1
Option 2: R-19.5
Option 3: R-22.6

Option 3 has the rigid insulation that covers the studs and thereby eliminates part of the thermal bridging explaining why it performs better. The above calculations also are for standard framing (a stud every 16”), if you were to account for all the extra lumber around the windows and doors the performance gap between Option 3 and the others would get even bigger.

Wow…that was a very long lead into to explain that we are using R-14 Roxul with 2” Styrofoam on top:

First step was to cut and fit Roxul into all stud openings. It cuts great with any serrated knife (just don't tell Jody that I used one of our good kitchen knifes).

Electrical boxes neede to offset 2" to account for rigid installation. They also need vapour boxes around them with electrical connections taped off. This prevents air and moisture from passing through the box. It is also the reason most older homes have drafts through the outlets in the winter time.

The rigid insuation is then intalled.

It is screwed on to the studs using recessed washers. Then all the vapour boxes are sealed and taped flush with the styrofoam.

So what does the mean for our LEED points: nothing really yet… First off we have only insulated 10% of our house so we haven’t met any criteria yet. And we do not get points for the insulation itself but rather the overall efficiency rating of the house (which is big points: up to 28 but we are hoping for 10). When complete, we are also hoping to get a half point for recycled content in the insulation.

How our Kitchen will be Green: Vampire Energy

Want to knock 10% off your power bill? On average that is how much power your home consumes not using appliances.

I believe the official term is "standby power" but it also called phantom load or my preference: vampire energy. This is essentially the amount of electricity that is sucked in by appliances, adapters, etc. just from being plugged in. There are two big culprits here:

- Standby features: anything with a clock, a power light or a remote control needs electricity when it is off. The flat screen TV doesn't know your are asking it to turn on via the remote unless there is a powered sensor constantly checking for a signal.

- Adapters: anything that has an adapter on the power cord is consuming power even if nothing is plugged into the other end. Chargers for cell phones and other electronics is the big culprit here.

I took a quick tour of our house and the vampires added up

• TV
• DVD player
• laptop
• VCR (yes we realize it is 2010)
• wii
• stove (digital clock)
• blender
• phone chargers (x 2)
• electric toothbrush
• clock radio (x 2)
• wireless modem
• Dustbuster
• vacuum cleaner charge station
• bread maker
• battery charger

We currently have no kitchen; so no microwave either but that is another common one.

So how do you stop it? unplug! .... but that can be easier said then done. Most people, including us, won't bother unplugging the TV every time they are done watching a show. Luckily, our house already has some switch controlled plugs. Our entire home entertainment system is on a power bar plugged into a socket that is controlled by a wall switch. When we leave the room we flip the switch: no more vampire energy.

Taking this into consideration for our new kitchen we realized that there are several appliances and chargers that we would like to leave plugged in for convenience sake but do not want to be drawing power. So the double outlet on the counter and the outlet by the desk with have switches built in.

Not a big change but hopefully it will help stop a little more of the energy drain and save us some money while we are at it. Or as this ad puts it, help us lose an excuse.

Life "Without" a Kitchen

One of the unique things about our LEED renovation, is that we are living in the house while we renovate. So, I wanted to share just how we are managing.

As crazy as it sounds, we wanted to do most of the renovations ourselves. The reasons being cost and we wanted firsthand experience with a LEED renovation. But, between work and family time, we don't have a lot left over to devote to the renovation. We estimated it would take us 3.5 months to complete the first phase of the project... a long time to be without a kitchen! To add to the typical difficulties of living without a kitchen, we have multiple food allergies in our family... so eating out/ordering in is a limited option for us.

The solution? Convert the dining room into a make shift kitchen. We bought a temporary pantry to house food and dishes, moved the refrigerator and stove into the dining room, and made the dining room table into more of a work space/eating area. We also packed up any non essential kitchen appliances (the popcorn popper is the one that has been missed the most) and many of our dishes.

Not too shabby, right? But wait, there is something missing... the kitchen sink and dishwasher! Yikes!

Not to worry! Being avid campers, we pulled out our plastic camp sinks and presto, luxury camping for the whole summer :) Who could ask for more!?!

Even the kids are enjoying washing dishes by hand in the camp sinks! Let's see how long their/our enthusiasm lasts! 4 weeks down, hopefully no more that 10.5 to go!

How our Kitchen will be Green: Cabinets

As we begin re-building our kitchen, our goal was to have something that was not just green but also liveable and affordable. As with most kitchen re-models a big part of the focus went into the cabinets. They determine the look and feel of the room but are also a huge factor in both how green and how healthy the room will be.

The big concern with cabinets is VOCs or Volatile Organic Compounds. These are chemicals that release in gas form at room temperature. So essentially air pollution that can have an impact on the environment and your health. And unfortunately in a typical home renovation (or construction) you are going to introduce a lot of them into your home. They are traditionally in your paint, glues, sealant, cabinets, flooring, cabinets, etc. In cabinets, they are caused by the formaldehyde in the melamine or the plywood glue.

Apart from the VOC issue, the green factor is impacted by the material and its source. Solid wood cabinets are the best choice for the VOC side but they wouldn't be very environmentally friendly if the wood came from hacking down swathes of the Amazon. (Solid wood cabinets also tend to be out of most peoples price range).

The best way to avoid introducing VOCs into a new kitchen is to not buy new cabinets. Re-facing or re-finishing existing cabinets is the greenest option: no new materials, no new chemicals. Our existing cabinets were in decent shape but with reconfiguring our kitchen space they didn't fit. So... we started shopping. To be honest it was a brutal to start. The first couple places we went that specialized in "green" cabinets gave us rough quotes of $40 to $50k, which was light years out of our budget.

Luckily though, with some late night surfing Jody found AyA kitchens (http://www.ayakitchens.com). A couple visits and we were sold. The cabinets were attractive, affordable, and green:

Green features:

• "EVO" particleboard box has no added formaldehyde and is made from 100% recycled content
• Wood doors are FSC certified (Forest Stewardship Council - which means how the wood was harvested was done so in a sustainable manner)
• All adhesives are also formaldehyde free
• Any plastics are lead free and non-VOC
• AyA also has a long list of green processes involved in their manufacture

Not only was the product green, but the beautiful kitchen in the pictures is the hard work of Tobi, AyA's designer/customer rep. We gave her dimensions and really rough guidelines of what we were after and loved what she came up with. So now we just need to wait 6-8 weeks for delivery.

LEED points: (MR2.2) A half point for "environmentally preferable" cabinets.

Our Kitchen Deconstruction

So we are complete the first phase of the kitchen project: the deconstruction. You might be asking what is the difference between demolition and deconstruction? about 1700lbs of garbage!

In changing our kitchen from this:


to this:


... you have to get rid of a lot of material. In a traditional demo, you go in with a sledgehammer knock everything down and ship it off to a landfill.

Actually to be fair, I imagine most people would have saved the cabinets. But that probably would have been the extent of it. Our deconstruction meant carefully taking everything apart. Drywall came off and was bagged for recycling. Existing insulation was was cut out of the framing for future re-use. Lumber was salvaged and all the nails pulled out.

To most people reading this, I imagine the idea of slowly prying off 1/2" round trim and pulling out all the finishing nails seems fairly crazy and two years ago (when we did our last reno) the idea never even occurred to me. But it is probably the same way everyone felt back in the 80's when people started suggesting we wash and sort our garbage. Since that time recycling has become second nature to most of us.

So why bother? As mentioned at the start we tore 1713lbs of material out of our kitchen. This is what made it to the landfill:



one 42 pound bag of garbage. So over 97% of the waste was diverted. Where did it end up?

827 lbs of drywall: to be recycled
20 lbs of insulation: to be reused
487 lbs of cabinets/counters: to be sold
22 lbs of metal corner bead: to be recycled
5 lbs of nails / screws: 20% reusable, 80% recycling
111 lbs of lumber: to be reused
137 lbs of plywood: to be reused / given away
54 lbs of trim: to be reused
10 lbs of electrical: aluminum wiring to be recycled, boxes and face plates re-used
40 lbs hood fan: to be sold



When it comes down to it, some of the above material will end up being waste. As an example some of the lumber will need to be trimmed because of damage but a huge chunk will have been diverted. Apart from generating less garbage there are some financial benefits to deconstruction as well: no dump fees and for every piece of material I reuse whether its a electrical outlet or a 2x4 I am saving cash.

The flip side; deconstruction takes twice as long as a demolition and is half as fun. So you need to evaluate your own project and patience to determine how much effort you are willing to invest.

In this post you'll notice there has been no reference to LEED points. I am disappointed to say that is because there are none. There is a prerequisite to document my diversion rate for demolition but points are only awarded for diverting construction waste (packing materials, drywall waste, etc.).