EEBA's High Performance Home Blog

At the 2025 EEBA Summit, a panel of builders and building science professionals, Andrew Guido, Tim O'Brien, Bill Rectanus, Gord Cooke, Bill Shadid, came together for a practical, candid discussion on what it really takes to deliver healthier, lower-carbon, and more resilient homes in today’s market. The tone wasn’t theoretical—it was grounded in field experience, trade-offs, and lessons learned from actual projects. The session was structured as a “lessons learned” conversation, moving through three major themes: healthy housing, carbon reduction, and resilience, followed by an open discussion on what’s working—and what isn’t—in real-world implementation. Healthy Homes: Building Science That Starts With Air The discussion opened with healthier homes, a topic that has been part of high-performance building conversations for years but continues to evolve in practice. Building science expert Gord Cooke emphasized that “health” in housing is broader than most people assume. It ... read more

Recently, we had the opportunity to take an exclusive tour of the IBHS Research Center in Richburg, South Carolina—a world-class facility dedicated to advancing building science and improving the resilience of homes and communities. The IBHS Research Center is operated by the Insurance Institute for Business & Home Safety, an independent, nonprofit research organization supported by the property insurance industry. Its mission is to translate science into action by identifying how buildings perform under real-world natural hazards and using that knowledge to reduce future losses and improve construction practices. What makes this facility truly unique is its ability to recreate severe weather conditions at full scale. On its 90-acre campus, researchers can simulate high winds, wind-driven rain, hail, wildfire ember exposure, and other extreme events to study how residential and commercial structures respond. This includes the massive 6-story test chamber equipped with a wall ... read more