HVAC ADHD Vodcast Season 2, Ep. 5 – Why HVAC Contractors Need Building Science with Chris Laumer-Giddens

The HVAC industry has spent decades focusing on equipment.

Chris Laumer-Giddens believes it's time to focus on the building.

In this episode of HVAC ADHD™, Jeremy Begley sits down with Chris to discuss how building science principles are reshaping HVAC design, residential construction, and high-performance homes.

As an architect, builder, HVAC designer, and educator, Chris brings a unique perspective that bridges the gap between construction and mechanical systems. His work has helped contractors understand why airflow, insulation, moisture control, ventilation, and building assemblies matter just as much as the equipment itself.

Throughout the conversation, Chris explains why some of the industry's most persistent comfort problems originate long before an HVAC system is installed.

Topics include:

• Building science fundamentals every HVAC contractor should know
• Why system thinking outperforms equipment-focused thinking
• The truth behind the spray foam controversy
• Moisture management and building durability
• Perfect Wall concepts and exterior insulation strategies
• Air sealing versus ventilation balance
• How architecture influences HVAC design outcomes
• Why collaboration between trades is critical
• The future of high-performance residential construction
• Lessons learned from decades in the field

Jeremy and Chris also discuss how technology, diagnostics, and building performance are changing expectations for contractors, designers, and homeowners alike.

This conversation highlights a major shift happening across the industry:

👉 Contractors who understand buildings will have a competitive advantage.

👉 Contractors who understand systems will deliver better results.

The future of HVAC isn't simply about higher-efficiency equipment.

It's about understanding the building as a complete system.

Whether you're involved in HVAC design, home performance, energy auditing, weatherization, building diagnostics, architecture, or residential construction, this episode provides practical knowledge that can improve comfort, efficiency, and long-term performance.

🚀 HVAC ADHD™ Season 2 is officially underway.

And we're just getting started.

Chris' Links: 

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chris-laumer-giddens-2280695/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/claumergiddens/

Website: https://www.lgsquaredinc.com/

🔗 WATCH & LISTEN

YouTube:
https://youtu.be/ZkWR9KgNNSc

Spotify:
https://zurl.co/SymZZ

Apple Podcasts:
https://zurl.co/qWpbU

🔗 Follow HVAC ADHD™

YouTube:
https://www.youtube.com/@HVACADHDMediaCo

Instagram:
https://zurl.co/kL5Of

Facebook:
https://zurl.co/akYBA

LinkedIn:
https://zurl.co/D8A7r

#HVACADHD
#HVACADHDVodcast
#ChrisLaumerGiddens
#JeremyBegley
#BuildingScience
#BuildingEnvelope
#HVACDesign
#HomePerformance
#Airflow
#StaticPressure
#PassiveHouse
#HighPerformanceHomes
#SprayFoam
#MoistureManagement
#AirSealing
#IndoorAirQuality
#EnergyEfficiency
#HVACTech
#HVACIndustry
#ContractorEducation
#BuildingDiagnostics

Transcript

0:02

Hey everybody, welcome back to the HVAC ADHD vodcast. I'm your host, Jeremy Begley. And today's guest is somebody I've respected in the industry for a long time because he lives at the intersection of architecture, building science, HVAC design, and actual real-world constructability, not just theory on paper. Today we're joined by Chris Limer Giddens of LG Squared Inc out of Atlanta, Georgia. Chris has one of the most unique perspectives in the high-performance building world because he's not just an architect and he's not just an HVAC designer. He's somebody who understands the entire building as a system, architecture, enclosure design, HVAC, moisture, constructability, and how all those pieces actually work together in the field. What makes Chris really interesting to me is he bridges the gap between building science theory and practical execution. He's worked alongside some of the biggest names in the industry, including Allison Bales and David Butler, two of my personal mentors. And he's become known for simplifying really complicated concepts around high-performing phone, perfect wall assembly, air filling, durability, and HBHC integration. And if you follow him online, you already know he's not afraid to challenge conventional thinkers, whether it's spray foam, building enclosure strategy, or the way the industry approaches performance-driven construction in general. This conversation gets deep into building science, HVAC design, architecture, process management, and why simplifying systems is often harder and smarter than making them more complicated. So if you're into high performance home, HVAC design, home performance, architecture, or just love nerding out on building science with some really smart people, you're gonna love this one. Let's get into it with Chris from LG Squared. Hey everybody, welcome back to the HVAC ADHD vodcast. I'm your host, Jeremy Begley. I'm here today with a fellow I've known for quite some time now, way, way back in the industry, dating back to when I first got into it, Chris Lammers Giddon of LG Squared. He's based out of Atlanta. And as a matter of fact, when I first met Chris or first interacted with Chris, he was working as a HVAC designer for Allison Bells. I doubt many people even remember that history, but he worked probably not that long and then went off and did his own thing. And then the next thing I heard about him, he was doing all this really cool shit. That's what we're gonna get into today. Chris, welcome to the show. Introduce yourself. Jeremy, thanks for having me, man. Yeah, it's been a long, like you and I have been interacting for years. I was started getting into social media thanks to Allison. He's a master at it. He was back in the Twitter days, and now he continues his awesome blog. From there, so I'm with LG Squared, a company that my wife started in 2006, Jody Lomergiddons. She started it as a residential renovation and new construction architecture firm in Tampa, Florida. And then 2008 happened, and Florida was hit really hard, so we were forced out, sort of, and came to Atlanta because they were like four job offers for me. So I took one of those and we've been thriving here ever since. But after the first nine months, the economy caught up to Atlanta, and then so I had to jump ship there, and that's where I met Allison. He was looking for someone to design HVAC systems. I've been an architect since uh about 99-2000. I started working at an architecture firm and commercial, and then did that for yeah, until 2008, off and on commercial, multifamily residential. Was in Colorado and then uh Louisiana and then Florida, and then we ended up in Atlanta. And so when I started with Allison, I I had a lot of experience with you know construction because I grew up a builder's kid. My stepdad was a builder and loved creating things and went off to college at University of Colorado. And so when I met Allison, he was in the residential market and he looked for, he's like, hey, we're we're gonna see a lot of need for HVAC design, and building science is a thing that's gonna catch on eventually. So we got into it there, and I just he's like, Hey, we do you, you know, I I said, I don't know how to do that HVAC design. He says, Well, you're gonna have to learn. So I spent hours and days with ACA, ACCA, with Wrightsoft, learning their software, learning the protocols. And then I also had a mentor, really good mentor, David Butler out of Arizona. Love that guy. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Super smart guy, almost too smart. Sometimes that guy will. I mean, I call him for a quick yes, we all have our own, you know, intelligence about it. I mean, and I say that in the best way possible. Like he's gonna take you down, you know, you may get in some conversations you did not expect when you start asking him questions. So I'll say that for sure. No, I call I call I can never make it's never a quick conversation with David. You never. So it I mean, I go for oh, just one thing that turns into four hours, you know. And so David taught me everything about HVAC design, really. And then I, you know, David taught me one of the most important lessons that has nothing to do with HVAC and has everything to do with how we make our money. One time I was asking him a question and he wrote me an email, and in the middle he answered half the question in the middle of the email, he said, and here I have to stop. If you would like to continue this conversation, I'm gonna have to charge you my hourly rate, blah, blah, blah, blah. I said, you know what, man? Yes, I'll pay your hourly hourly rate gladly. And like you taught me something that is the most valuable thing that I could ever learn, is like our time is our most important thing. Even people with the best intentions will suck your time as you let them. So, like, that is like just one of the best little lessons in like how to do business in this space that I ever learned from anybody was was in that conversation from him. Yeah, I mean, people will take advantage of you if you open the door to just, hey, if you have any more questions, let me know. Yeah, that's a dangerous, that's a dangerous thing to say, right? Yeah, it's just they'll just keep going and going and going. And and in our position as architects, well, as what we do, you know, owners call and think that, oh, well, let me just pick your brain for a little while before I hire you to make sure I like you. Well, that could go an hour or two hours, and they've already got design ideas by then. And so we've started to charge for initial phone calls, you know, when when we know it's gonna turn into something more than just, okay, let me see what what do you want for a house, and you know, we'll put together a proposal. So we're starting to get into that in some cases. But yeah, David is one same thing. And what he's really good at, too, and this is something I really need to continue to do, is he'll say, he'll kind of say, okay, I'm starting the clock now, and then at the end of it, he'll say, Okay, I've I've logged in 1.75 hours on this call. Yeah. Oh, I just love it. And so clients really like that. You know, you can you can make a lot of progress and a lot of uh earn a lot of trust that way if you just say, Look, I'm at 1.75 when it comes time to reaching that, you know, the limit that we set in the proposal, you're gonna know because I keep telling you how much time I've spent. So that was really good. Uh so yeah, he's still a friend. He's gonna come visit us in France one of these, one of these days and do a little traveling. And uh so yeah, he and then you know, Joe Steebrick was a mentor, uh, mostly what he didn't know it, but more reason more recently, I'm able to call him and email him and ask questions, and he helps kind of go through some of the stuff that just, you know, I of course I know the physics behind it, but it seems like, gosh, couldn't we do it simpler? Do we really have to do this? And he'll just break it down for me and say, Don't don't overthink it, you know, and that's what I hear. I hear that a lot. Well, I mean, and he's the master of that, man. He is the master of simplification, like he can make something that is so complicated be so simple, like nobody I've ever met, and that's why he is who he is, man, because like he just you know he has that ability. David's the same way when it comes to HVAC. Like, David is basically the Joe Steve of HVAC, in my opinion. You know, like I make those type of analogies a lot, but like another thing is like building science uh the HEAC Symposium is basically the building science camp of the HVAC world. Like those things are, you know, we have them in each world and they intertwine, but it's not exactly the same thing. And I feel like Steve and Butler are probably from their knowledge level in their space, they're probably you know about peers as far as that that that goes. I one of the most innovative things, and it's still something that can be applied today with these cold weather heat pumps, but back in the early push for heat pumps, David you know, is the one who wrote about, and then Allison too, to to a lesser extent, piggybacking off what David had come up with, but basically we were calling it above-ground geothermal, where we were taking on wall heater and pairing it with a hydronic air handler, and then just basically taking a good old single-stage heat pump and winding it out and getting every bit of juice for the squeeze that you can out of it and supplementing it with, you know, no less than 99% efficient backup heat, you know, at the same exact time, supplementally and incrementally, just like you know, a heat pump with resistance heat works. So, like it was a very cool thing, and at that time it achieved something that you couldn't really achieve without that. Now we have the cold weather heat pumps, so you can run them down to the temperatures, but in natural gas markets where it makes sense to have that sort of dual-fuel situation, you can really do some cool, cost-effective uh stuff with that same setup still to this day. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. David, David is the one that helps me when I get into a little more of the advanced systems. I mean, I'm an architect back to who I am, but I'm an architect by training. I learned HVAC mid mid-career, and you know, I do building science, I do plumbing design now, and I still and I was a GC for a while. And so this is it's not my full-time thing, right? So I know how to do, I kind of have a baseline for some of this and of where my knowledge goes to. I mean, you know, like Ross Trothui, if you know him, and some of the systems that you talk about, and some of the, you know, they're systems that I I can design them, but they're so involved that having people like David to really just look over my shoulder and say, yes, that's the right direction. Because you don't do them every day, right? Those systems are complicated. And if that was my full-time thing, full-on engineering, of course I wouldn't have I wouldn't struggle with it, or shouldn't say struggle, but I wouldn't need his help. But standard systems, you know, air source heat pumps, ground source heat pumps, even the typical ones that we see in homes, doing those all the time. Hundreds, thousands of them. Those are that's what he taught me how to do. But it's nice to have him as a backup. Now he's retired. He said he'll come out of retirement for me, which is great. That's wonderful. And yeah, so he does occasionally. He came out of retirement to help us design a mechanical system for a yoga studio. Now that is something I didn't want to take on by myself, you know. That's complicated with steamers and trying to ventilate. We didn't do any AC in there because it was hot yoga. Wow. Yeah. I mean, it was it was a very cool system. Still had to handle moisture though, huh? So that was that's probably a fun one there. Yeah. Gigantic fresh air. Yeah. And that was our airflow right there. We didn't have an air handler for heating and air. And it was uh it was infrared panels. Oh, this ERV was what was you know pushing air through there, and we had sensors all over. Oh my gosh. It was so much fun. I learned so much from that, and we didn't get to we didn't get to commission it, unfortunately. Uh the builder, something happened with the whole process, and they changed everything, and they just stopped it. Just said, you know what, we're we we can take it from here. But it was an incredible system that would have worked, would have been one of the most efficient, most that like with the best indoor air quality yoga studios anywhere. It was amazing. That is pretty cool. What so tell me just about your business model? Because I assume that you were designing the architecture and also doing the HVAC systems and sort of design build business model or something like that. So, what is it? How is the breakdown for you? Like, what are you doing? Yeah. Anything to do with a house, whether it's new or old or existing, we can make it happen. So if you if you kind of stack up who you hire to get a house built from, you know, you got the architect, you got an interior designer, you sometimes have HVAC designers when you're smart in a project. Plumbing design is a good idea, electrical layout is good, uh, structure. If you stack all those up, all the consultants there, and you just smash it into one, that's us. We also were a GC, so now we we do more of an advanced construction administration, which is almost like a owner's agent. But so the way I we explain it to homeowners is we bring builders on as early as possible, ideally from day one. And whether, you know, they may not put in a lot of hours towards the beginning, but as the project, as the design develops, you know, we're in charge of everybody on the team. Landscape is one thing we don't do, civil engineering we don't do. So we'll bring those in and we'll work with the builder and we'll just you know, we have we control the whole process and we do that all the way through, get to construction documents, and we're designing every component of it, HVAC, structure, architecture, interiors, all of it. And then when it goes into construction, the builder takes over and he manages us and we're part of his process. But the owner has the assurance that we are involved, and most of the time they pay us directly. So we're a third party that the builder agrees to incorporate into the process so that we're there at scheduled intervals, scheduled milestones, so that you know, like a mock-up wall at the beginning, and just making sure all of our design is executed properly because what we're doing is not imported, it's not anything complicated. In fact, we're trying to simplify everything, and we have developed a foundation detail that people are freaking out about because it's too simple. They don't understand it because it's overly simple. We're trying to simplify this whole you know, building enclosure, getting durable, resilient homes that for everybody. And so even though it's simple, there's still things they haven't done. So then we're incorporated into the construction part of it. And with our experience as a builder, we understand cost, we understand the process, we we say, hey, you're gonna need to order that now. And then when it also like we put on a fluid applied, you know, WRB, the builder may not have done that before, and we say, Well, just get your painter, give him, give me 10 minutes with your painter, and he will know how to do it. Same with continuous insulation. So we have all this experience with some of these methods, some of these materials, but it's all about the process of construction. It's not about material versus material, you know, like And that's why that's what's so cool about what you're doing, dude. You get to manage every single aspect, like you're not dealing with the jack, you know, you know how it is. Like one thing's out of place in one person's silo that they just put blinders on and forgot about the other guy that was coming before or after them, and then they, you know, then your whole entire plan's ruined. So, like what you're doing is really cool because you get to manage it, you know, the process from the inside out, plus you understand what actual high performance means. Like, it's not a thing that's a green building certification, it's not a thing, and you know, it can be, but a hundred times, you know, I've seen green building certified homes that have all the same problems that every other home built. So it really is not any of that stuff, it is more the attention to detail and the attention to process, like you said. And like I love the fact that you have control over pretty much all the process, even when you're working with the builder, by that time they probably have been involved. Like you said, you get them involved as soon as possible. So they already understand the goals in the game and what it is that you're doing and how you're trying to accomplish it. And so then, you know, you're just in the background making sure that that gets accomplished, but it's their show. Like I love everything about that particular process. And I don't think there's many companies that are doing it all the way through like that. It's very hard to be able to own every piece of that the way that you guys are. Yeah, we're yes, that's true. I mean, we we've been we've had marketing people ask us who is our competition, and we have no clue who to give them. We have no idea. Like there's nobody. There are other firms who do, I've seen architecture firms who also kind of do HVAC design or incorporate it into their process, or architecture and interiors, that's pretty common. Uh but having having the construction, the plumbing, the electrical, that's somewhat common with architects. But having control over that entire uh over the whole thing and being able to present to the builder ideas that actually work rather than an architect's idea who's never been in the field. We're not there. We're you know, they're so we can present things to them. And sometimes they call it crazy. You know, they say that's an expensive way to do it, but it's pretty rare, you know, and so they give me another idea and I say, shit, I overthought that one. So yes, do it your way. And that's cool dynamic, too. And they feel like they have that type of input and it does work, you know, and you're like, yeah, you're right. I probably feel great about that. And that type of process and that type of building to have that type of input probably feels really good for the builder to know, hey, I might think this is all new, but when I start thinking about it, it's not anything we haven't done before. You know, it's just doing it consistently is the only thing. That's exactly right. And and I tell the builder, I'm like, you know, this is I need your input because you're the one out there doing this. So if I do something that isn't something you you think you're gonna have to charge more for because your trades are gonna, you know, your guys are gonna or gals are gonna say, This is nuts, I'm gonna have to double charge you on this one because I've never seen it. Tell me that. We'll come up with something else. There are a million ways to skin a cat or whatever. And so I that is like priority number one with builder. I said, look, we have to come up with ways that you can execute and you are comfortable with executing. So I need your input 100% of the way. So that's why we try to get them involved early because I don't want to, you know, develop something that just makes their job harder. And then that that's a that's not a win for the owner because the owner is paying for that learning curve or you know, the change orders or the complication, and there's no need for that. So I had a builder once I was doing a rain screen, this is about 15 years ago. He was doing a spec house, and I said you know, I had recommended a rain screen product called Home Slicker. You're familiar with that one. It's this it's a mesh, so it's a stiff, somewhat stiff mesh that you put over the sheathing, over your WRB, and then and then you just attach your siding through the mesh and it holds it off like a quarter of an inch, three sixteenths. So he was like, Look, I don't want to have to buy that. Can I just take two layers of building felt, rip it into one and a half inch strips, nail it to the sheathing, and then attach my siding? And I'm like, that's totally brilliant. That is cheaper than branding rain screen, I'm sure. I'm not familiar, but I know all nothing's gonna be as cheap as that method for sure. I mean, yeah, I mean that was that that's the kind of in the the that's the kind of builder that of course makes our process go well for the owner and for us, is that a builder who's like, okay, let me think, let me listen to what your what the goal is. And I that's a huge part is I always try to explain the why. Why are we doing it? Absolutely. And and that's our video. All our videos, I try all of it to say, hey, why is it that we're doing this? I don't always do that. It's sometimes I'm just saying, here's what we did. But I always try to say why because it's so important, and that's what my what the followers, the audience, they're that's what they're asking for. Videos are awesome, man. I get a lot out of them. I love it. I love watching them. Cool. Thanks, man. And you know, that's when I started doing it, I was like, Well, this this sharing thing is kind of cool, you know, and and since then I've learned that both Risinger and Joe, well, Joe started it years ago with He's like his his mentor told him, he's like, share everything. That's what you mean. You need to just everything you learn, everything you put on paper, everything you do, just share it. That's how we're gonna progress. Because then people are out there kind of pushing that needle, moving that needle. And if if more than just Joe is doing it, it's only gonna make everything a little bit easier to get to accomplish. Because if he's on an island doing this thing, things are gonna cost too much and he can't do what he wants to, what he needs to do for the best result. So he and then look at what Matt does. I mean, look how much content he has out there for totally free. It's insane, yeah. You could get a whole entire building science education if you just went through all his videos, organized them, put them in, you know, put them in some kind of organized learning fashion, and just went through them. There's enough to chronologically learn what you need to know to get into the building science world and start making a business of it for sure. Yeah. Of course, there's there's a there's a risk in that too, because we get a lot of uh homeowners who come and say, basically, they've gotten their YouTube building science degree either from Matt or just a combination. They've watched all of our videos, Matt's videos, and they come to it and say, Okay, I'm thinking about this, that, and the other. I say, Well, all three of those things that you just mentioned don't work for your house in Atlanta, Georgia. Yeah, that is the problem. There is concept that it's not there without without knowing what you know about weather and things like that for sure. Like, and that's, I mean, we're just gonna have to learn how to deal with that because now ChatGPT, they can get a million wrong answers and feel like they know everything. Dude, it's ChatGPT, we'll have them convinced, or any of these AI things will have them convinced, you know, that what you're hearing is a hundred percent the correct thing. And like, I use that stuff extensively, but you also have to train it to go find the information that is in the context of what you are you're talking about and looking for, or else you're gonna get some answers that sound confidently correct that are a thousand percent wrong from that thing. So I just think it's the world we're in now, man. We gotta be able to like know our business better than we ever have before because you're gonna probably be defending there. I am a hundred percent sure that somebody is gonna get in a room with a homeowner and the homeowner's gonna say something, they're gonna be like, dang, I didn't know I didn't know that, and then they're gonna find out they didn't know it because it is a 1000% not a real thing, you know? So like yeah, they're I'm yeah, it's just it's a brave new world for sure with the AI. It is, and I I'm I'm kind I am using chat all a lot, and I do it a lot too mostly mostly for because as an architect, you're not our most architects aren't good writers. Like we just we case struggle with we with our creative brain or whatever. We I mean everybody has creativity in their brain. That that sounded that sounded elitist. But the way my brain works, and architects are notorious for this, is that we just can't seem to fluidly just write because we're analytical and we have to everything has to be perfect. And so, like Mark Twain said, I would have written you a shorter letter if I had more time. If I when I was writing a blog regularly, it would take me a week to get one blog post done because I'd have to come back to it and come back to it because and edit, edit, edit, because I would just sort of spit it out once on the same. And then come back and just hack it up. Yeah, and then I would send mine to a friend and have them edit it to make sure it didn't sound crazy or dumb or anything, too. So it would literally is the last at least a week turnaround for anything I ever wrote. That's why I was never consistent at it. I never had the time to like sit and be Allison where I could just write, you know, something and spit it out and get it out there and sound like the god of you know building science or whatever, like Allison has an act to do. So like it, I value, I think you're saying the same thing, and I value it the same way. Like I'm gonna dump a diarrhea of ideas into it, and it can logically organize them and help me get you know my stuff out a lot quicker. I'm writing blog, you know, a couple blogs a week now with that thing, and it's all my thoughts, it's just helping me review, edit, and organize the thing a lot better, you know, a lot quicker. There's no there's no there's not it's not any different from having an editor or having an assistant or having someone to help you write something. It's you know, there's there's a kind of a you know, people look at it a weakness or a cheating way to to get to well, but it's the same thing. We do this. We go to a library and we read some text and that helps us organize our thoughts. Or you know, so it it's a good way, and I always vet it. It's I spend a lot of time vetting what it spits out of course, right? I because in the beginning, like I've been using it since beta, and I was trying to do some of my training presentations with it, and it would give me formulas, and I'd be like, it would look so close to the actual formula where I'd almost be like, okay, but if just something would be weird, I'm like, I need to check that and then it would be a hundred percent wrong. So, like that's what I learned way on early on. Like, if you don't know it's right, you better check and make sure it's right because you know it could be really wrong. Yeah. So I want to say something about or back to Allison for a minute, because just about this subject about writing and how he how he writes. So he would write a a post every day, essentially, for for a while. Early in the early days, he was just cranking that stuff out. He was a machine, right? Yes. So I would get to the office, you know, probably 7 a.m. or something like that. I rode my bike across town. I'd get in there, and he would come in, you know, around nine o'clock, but he had been up by like four or five a.m. And he had written that blog in those hours at home. He's like with his laptop and he'll write for hours there, and he comes in. But he does it all in a single day. But but because his because he's such a good writer, right, he can get his thoughts on, put them on the on the screen in a more organized way from the start. So by 10 o'clock, or whenever I think it was nine or ten o'clock, he had a scheduled time. He's like, I gotta get it out by this time, because he was understanding all the algorithm algorithms and he was you know, blog spot or something. Is that what the name of that was? Uh there was a that is what it was, I think. Blog spot. I think I had something on there too at one time. Yeah. So he had learned a lot from them and he was just he was like, that's what you're talking about. You're talking about HubSpot. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's the one. Yeah. So he was he was really in, he really understood all that, all those metrics and things, and that's what he taught me. And then when I went out on, I did a couple of posts while I was there, but then when I went when I left there, started my own blog, and and it was just uh, you know, the magic of what he was teaching, you know, it was like, oh, this is great. But he understood that. And he and man, that guy could just I mean, he had all this stuff in his brain, right? And he'd learn it. Maybe he'd read one of Joe's papers or he heard something somebody else said. He's like, I'm gonna take, I'm gonna kind of spin off from that and write this thing. He is excellent at that. I've seen him so many times like further explain something that was already tremendous and still do a good job of adding so much value to the thing that was already there in the first place. Like, yeah, for sure. Yeah, yeah. Talk about a talk about a someone who can really make things simple. I haven't read his book, but I have recommended it more than you know, many times because I know that it will simply almost like my father-in-law was a is a was a historian, and the way he wrote books was like a novel. So when you write, when you're reading this real history, he would quote people based on their journals. So he was typing, he was writing Florida War History, and he a seminal war history, and he would so he'd find these journals from the soldiers and whatever they wrote in there, he would, he would from that be able to use that as a quote. He said, Oh yeah, so and so said this today. Well, he then used that character to then tell the story, but he literally quoted it. And I think, you know, and he made it made it more readable, more like, oh, now I'm really interested in this, because it sounds like I'm reading a novel, and those are more interesting than pure history, right? The way pure history books are typically written. And so Allison is like that, where this is for everyday people, you know, it's everybody can read this, and yeah, he gets real nerdy, of course. He's a physics profess a retired physics professor, and now he's a building science dude. Yeah, and so he's like, but he's and he uses a lot of those terms, but he still makes it really readable, which is admirable, and I want to be like him with that. I think everybody does. Anybody that's on the internet trying to create content probably wants to be like Allison because, like you said before, he's like early on the master of consistent content creation and and followers and everything that goes along with putting your knowledge out there for everyone to partake of. He's really, really good at it. And so good. Like so on it. So let's get uh let's talk about spray foam. That's been a big conversation that's been going around the the internet. Um, I don't hate it, I don't not hate it. I think that it has its place. What are your exact thoughts? Like, do you are you 100% like we should never use spray foam? Where do you stand? I you know, I saw we've been back and forth and we had a little bit of uh conversation on LinkedIn, but like what is your actual stance on the whole entire spray foam thing? There's always a better way, or it has its place, or how do you feel about it? We don't need it. We don't need it, it doesn't solve anything that something else can't solve. There there, I don't think there's a place for it at all. I don't it's to me, uh we don't need to be building our buildings with plastic. We are getting away from where we were. We were building homes before insulation. The homes that are lasting now, the ones that are still standing from a hundred years ago or more, didn't have insulation. The air moved through the building assemblies and dried. When we started adding insulation, things changed. The the heat, heat energy, the heat flow changed. The physics. Joe in 1980, in the 1980s um covered, he was he was told, he said, go out there and figure out what's happening with the paint, you know, the paint peeling on our siding. He says, Well, I already know. He says, Well, you need to go out there and show and prove it. Right? So he went out there and he said, Oh, all I have to do is lift this this lap siding and give it a gap, and everything works fine. Well, that led to him explaining the perfect wall and and how that system works. It's not his idea, he'll tell you, that's not my idea. I just gave it a name, is what he says. So with the perfect wall, we have a vented cavity behind our cladding, what whatever that cladding is. That and then the vapor permeability and the insulation. If you put the insulation to the outside, then you have controlled, you you control the temperature of the sheathing, which is what you want to do, and that thickness changes. But we know how to build walls and with insulation now. And we need to, yes, we need to make them super airtight, get them insulated properly, or else the insulation doesn't work right. So we know how to do it, but because of what happened in the 80s in the peeling paint, because of insulation, we started coming up with these products that would stop airflow or like vapor barriers, they put those in the walls. That was the other issue. But we started coming up with non-rot materials, building, we don't want things to rot. Well, it wasn't the material that was, it was the cause of the rot. It was the process, right? Like we weren't we weren't giving it a gap when we had the insulation. And so here we are getting away, we're sort of reacting, which is what America is really good at. We react, we're more of a reaction society than a proactive society. So we're reacting to this with all these products and materials and that are supposed to fight against rot and mold. Spray foam came into the picture because we wanted air sealing and insulation and something cheap and easy. Well, that started to come in, and then we started almost immediately seeing problems, right? I mean, years years, years in, it didn't hold up very well, and then they started to develop the right the mix, and then it started to trap moisture because they didn't do the process right. Spray foam technically can work if it's done in a if it's done in a lab under the right conditions, and it fills up every single crevice and the cavity is perfectly airtight. We need to have products, we need to have a process that is more forgiving to the way the building moves, the way we do renovations and additions because spray foam hides our mistakes a hundred percent. It hides our mistakes, it creates mistakes. There's never been a single spray foam install or any type of foam. This goes for all foam plastics. It all should go away from the industry a hundred percent. I tell my crews foam is a four-letter word, it's an F-word, don't don't use it. So we've started to What's your preferred air like continuous air barrier product besides the weatherwise air barrier on the outside, or how are you guys handling that, I guess? Like what the spray frame is used for, or what people say they use it for. Sure. Well it if you back to the quote the perfect wall, the the air, all of your control layers are at the same spot. It's all on the exterior side of the sheathing. So our air barriers are at the same are where the WRB is. So it's on the outside of the sheathing all the way around or on the outside of the structure all the way around the building, and then we cover that with our insulation. And whether it's two inches or four or eight, you you can balance that and have some cavity insulation. But you have enough out here to control the temperature of the sheathing the way you need to. Then you can put some in here, but you can't put too much because then that changes the energy flow, and you could get condensation still. So you have to be careful, you have to have the right ratio of these things. Everything to the outside, 100%. And I can't, I don't know that anybody can argue that it's easier to air seal from the inside of a building than it is from the outside. I've done a lot of it, and I wouldn't think so. So, my one thing, so I get all that from a new construction standpoint, but here's my butt about all that. I've been upside down, inside out, in some compromised positions where I'm trying to air seal something in an existing house, and because of the expansive properties of the foam, it expands six times its normal size upon application if you're doing it right. I have been able to air seal some buildings that I don't think I'm gonna air seal any other way without unless I have spray foam, unless there's some other expansive product where I can get up where I'm not even looking at the thing and stick my hand in there and shove something back there and pull a trigger and let it fill a cavity that I know needs to be filled to stop air. Like, I don't know where else I get that from without spray foam. Like, unless we're gonna take the building apart and put it back together, then we're talking about something different than what we were actually doing there, especially like in weatherization where the budget is the budget is the budget, and like you know what your objective is. Like, there's gotta be if there's another thing and another product that can do that that way, I'm open to it, but I don't see like just because of the world, how I got here to where I am, which is through a bunch of existing houses for a very long time, you know, like fixing them from the inside out, like I don't see a way that sure, if you get somebody to pay for deconstruction and reconstruction, which if you're doing home performance or permanent load reduction or any of these things, like you are gonna be doing some deconstruction and reconstruction or else you're not gonna be accomplishing much of anything. But like the extent to which you can get somebody to pay for that in a residential situation is not always conducive to being able to take something apart to the point where you could put it back together in an air-filled manner and feel good about what you did. Like, that is where I the only place that I see spray foam. But in new construction, sure. I mean, if we have control of the design and we have control of everything, then there's better ways to do it. It's the same way with heat pumps and all this other stuff. Sure, I can put a heat pump on any new house because I can guide you to where what we need to do to make sure that heat pump's gonna work the way that we want it to work 100% of the time. But like on an older home that exists, I don't know that I can put a heat pump on there just straight away as a replacement and feel great about what it's gonna do in the heating season in particular, and probably even in the cooling season during the humid, most humid times of the year. So, like the and even if we designed it and sized it and all that, I still don't think that with certain buildings it's gonna do what you want it to do without complaints and without degrading the building worse and stuff like that. So, like that is sort of where I'm at with the spray foam conversation. Like, I get the new construction, sure, we can design it out all day long, but like when it comes to existing buildings, like what's the better way? Like, what is the substitute for what we do with spray foam there? First of all, expansion isn't the same as reach. So if you can't if you can't get that foam, it it's gonna expand, yes. I have no I I I don't doubt that at all. I don't but it does not necessarily reach the areas that you're trying to reach by relying on the expansion. So and and then you don't know. You don't know if it got everywhere that you want to get. Well, what if you leave enough of a gap back there? Because if you had trouble getting to it, the spray foam probably has a similar difficulty getting to every little crack and crevice in that wherever you're spraying that in that tiny, you know, low space, right? So the issue there is just you can't rely, it's not a magic thing. This is this is not it's not about this as a product, it's about the system. You know, the insulating, it's an insulation system. And so in the case of old buildings, we had one recently, 1930, I believe. Beautiful architecture. Like that was it was an architect who designed it for himself, simple in the high-end re neighborhood of Atlanta. And on the back, they had a cricket that you know, they had two valleys coming together. You know, that's your architect for you. So they had the val the two the two, sorry, two gables coming together, and then they had a valley that they needed to put a cricket on. That was all part of the attic, the attic shape. So from the inside, what what I was proposing is let's get everything to the roof line, encapsulate your attic, get all your mechanical equipment inside your your building, your thermal envelope. And this is gonna help you. I mean, that the windows were single pane metal or steel, super leaky and really conductive, right? You're losing a lot, and it's just but they're beautiful. They're made in England, they're just gorgeous, and I didn't really want to get rid of them. So I was like, okay, well, let's do something really good with the attic. Well, that cricket was a ter was a pain in the ass, right? And so we couldn't get in there with my strategy was to put a blown-in insulation or even a bat could work, but we would fur down, you know, they're old two by sixes back in the day, yeah. Like for the roof rafters. Sure, and tricky. So we would fur yeah. So we'd probably have to do some sistering and furring down, you know, for that roof structure to hold this new additional weight, because it wasn't designed for that. It was already not designed to hold up the slate roof that was up there, but it's it's it's hanging on. So the two by six, we'd fur it down so we'd get some better depth, and we fill that up with insulation, but we put a ventilation or put a baffle above that, an insulation baffle that of course is is air sealed at the bottom at the top plate. But to do that in that very low cricket area, almost impossible. Like getting in there, and even if you could crawl in there, which you couldn't, it was going to be like that. It was gonna be a nightmare. And I I even with a spray gun, a spray foam gun, I I couldn't have seen how you would insulate all of that, that whole attic area. So what we did as a combination, we actually insulated from the outside, we redid that cricket, added a little slope to it, put on some continuous exterior on the outside, and then that thermal layer was connected to the thermal layer inside. There was a continuity, it went through the sheathing, yes. But we accounted for that. And so we did we did just that one little cricket area. So if you got a whole roof that's like a Frank Lloyd Wright, really low pitched prairie style home, and you're trying to insulate that attic, well, one, you nobody would do that to a Frank Lloyd Wright home. I had somebody ask me to try. It's a story for another day, but there's a fellow uh named Tom Laurie that is in Cincinnati, Ohio, and he uh an architect and you But he is so obsessed with like lead and green and stuff. He owns, I don't know if he still owned it, but he did at the time, a legit Frank Lloyd Ride house. And he had me come out and say, Tell me how to insulate it. I walked out of there like I don't know what to tell you, bud. Like, there ain't nothing we can do here that's not gonna totally ruin this uh the aesthetic of the whole entire house, you know. Because what one, there's so much glass, and then there's a clear stories, and then like you said, the roof basically does not exist. Like it just isn't Yeah, yeah. They weren't, yeah. He didn't, I mean, they weren't designed to be insulated back then. They definitely weren't designed. They just it was just like, okay, this house is always gonna have air going through it, so it's all fine, you know, and to just block the main wind with the walls and drapes will keep the sun out, but my windows his windows were terrible. But that's what that was the standard at that time. So so when you have those low-pitch areas, yeah, it's tough. And if it's historic architecture, which we've dealt with before, you have to deal, you have to respect the profile, right? Yeah. So we did we had an 1835 uh farmhouse that we moved. Well, we didn't move it, but the owner had it moved three miles to a new location. It was super cool. I have a video from way, way back. It's on my other, my personal channel, showing how we moved it. That was really cool. Yeah, that's amazing. It looked like it was because the cotton fields they were in bloom. And so the it looked like it was floating across the top of the cotton fields. It was pretty neat. I'll send you the video. That's cool. That's cool. So we moved that, and and of course, being in 1835, it still had its cornice, but it had to be rebuilt. So the the the whole the the trim detail up at the top of the roof had to be in some areas had to be rebuilt because it was uh 1835 and kind of abandoned for a while. So in that process of rebuilding that, we also added three inches of insulation to the roof. And so there's a you know, we did a historic preservation field school in Hawaii before we went out into the world. And part of that, I mean, you have these distances between the cornice, between that trim and the top of the the upper floor windows that you have to respect, right? So when you add three inches, you either have to expand that trim so you get that same relationship, or you just move it up and resp and maybe make the trim larger. But all of it has to be in to respect that period of time, that architecture, that style. So the beauty of that is, and and this is where having that being able to control all of the systems of the house, the building enclosure, and the architecture, is that we can control how this thing looks. I've heard I recently was listening to a podcast. They were the great architect, great designer, and he was he mentioned this whole section I posted about this on Instagram. Uh well, I posted about it this this week. And he was saying, like, look, the people who really weigh, you know, like lean into the building science, their buildings are ugly. Right? And so he kind of deferred to other people to do the building science, saying, Okay, well, that's for other people to do. But there was no mention of we make sure we incorporate them into our designs every single time, even though we don't know it, we need to bring them in. That's control, right? So in our case, we control it because we're doing it in-house. But in his case, it was like it was a dismissive approach to this, and this is so, so critical. It's our opportunity. Architects are control freaks. This is Alison Bale said this is be a control freak. It's our opportunity. I always say the architects are the third control layer, right? You got you got your control layers that we know about, but the architects are literally a control layer in the building process, like they they 100% are. And that's one of the cool things about understanding building science when you're an architect, you have a chance to control a lot of stuff if you understand what it is. Like a lot, you know, a lot of the way the building performs and everything. Well, you can use it to your advantage also. Exactly. I I I I always look at it as an opportunity to I think I said in the post about like depth and shadows, and these are things that architects love to talk about. It's like look at look at the the shadows that we can create on that window. I mean, that's from you know, continuous insulation. Take advantage of these other these this way of building, understanding this perfect wall, and incorporate it into your design, and you'll be surprised at how much better your buildings can look with it rather than letting the builder decide after you've done your drawings, hey, we're gonna use some sort of insulated sheathing or continuous stone wool. Well, they're not gonna redo their drawings. They're gonna probably figure it out in the field, and most cases, if it's really custom, you know, the architect makes the changes. But a lot of projects, they're like, Well, you're gonna lose your architecture if you don't incorporate this stuff and decide on every single layer and stop using by others, right? That by others thing that we put, I don't know if you know about this, but it's very common in in architectural drawings, especially commercial. You see this note it says insulation by others or you know, flashing by others. It just is yeah, it's like we're not accountable for that. It's a yeah, it's basically a way to get out accountability. We do it a lot, and I this is the same thing in HVAC, like with our very specific verified process that we've created, like we don't allow people to do the normal thing, which is the same thing in the HVAC world or our mechanical engineering world, where they'll be like or comparable. Like, no, there's no or comparable, like it's you know, like the these systems all have different performance profiles, and the reason that we selected this system is because it works with this house. If we go do an or comparable, then we're gonna probably lose something in the design. So, like, we definitely don't, you know, like, and we've got some pushback. Like, guys are like, well, that's our brand. Like, okay, well, then you're gonna have to pay us to put it all the way back through the equipment selection process to make sure that your brand works for this design because that is not the brand that we agreed on when you paid for the design. So, like, you know, it's a it's one of those things. Like, I've been through a lot of processes where people want to say this or that is your fault, and then it's not implemented the way the design was, or there's a piece of it. So now I have learned over the years like we have a very specific process that we use. And if you're gonna ask us to stand on our design, then we're gonna ask you to install the thing that we designed. I mean, I think you know, tip for tat, quid pro quo, that's pretty acceptable, you know. Yep. Yeah. Yeah. I had an HVAC contractor, really good friend of ours that we'd used for many projects and known for years. And, you know, we were becoming even friends on the side, you know, going hanging out. And he was at one of the jobs that we designed everything, mechanical, all of it. And he showed up and they had put a duct in a different place. And I approached, you know, we I brought it up to him when I came to visit the job, and he went through like, why did this go here? And I said, Well, but you know, this this isn't, I put it there for a reason. And he turned to me and said, Chris, these are just a suggestion. You know, like no, that's how they think. I mean, most of most mechanical engineers are saying have some note in there that says they can change stuff in the field. That is a very common thing with mechanical engineering. Like, they're basically like, this is not set in stone, it is a suggestion. You need to field engineer because we don't know what you're gonna run into out there. Like, we do not take that. Well, I will take that approach if people don't want to pay for CA. That's another one of the things that, like, the whole David Butler thing is like, yeah, I'll write up a whole entire commissioning plan. I will make sure that this design will work exactly like we say it will, but you will have to pay us to do that because that costs money and time and that's not free service. We offer it, like I did used to make the mistake of not offering up front, and then people would be like, Oh, well, you never told us that, or you never said that. So, like now it says it right in our contract. Like, you can here we'll sell it to you in blocks of time up front, or you can pay for it, you know, after the fact, you can come back to us and ask us to open the contract back up and help you get this thing right. But like we definitely feel like A, the design is not the design if anything all the way down to the commissioning is done different than what we specified, and B, any and all that costs time and money. So it does, yeah. And the rest of that story that I probably should have said at the beginning was I was running the job. I was a builder at that time. So I was running that job, I was the architect, I was the HVAC designer, so I knew where I knew so well where all the framing was. I knew exactly where these things go. It's amazing. And he had his own idea of where it should go that it's better, and I said, No, it's like that because it will affect the performance of the system. I will lose some static pressure, I will lose a throw in that room or whatever I was designing for. And at the bottom on every sheet of every time we do an HVAC design, it says no changes at all are allowed unless they're reviewed or that unless you ask LG squared. Like you can't don't make any changes. Follow it to the T. If and if the information's not in there, because I even tell them what line set sizes to get, and I do the DSB file if you know Mitsubishi does the DSB. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. So I give the DSB file output and I say that tells them the length and the size of so we're very specific, but there are things that are just like accessories that I don't, you know, I don't really put those in there because they kind of come with these this equipment. I say what size the duct is, and I say that it's metal and things like that. I mean I I spec everything that I can, and there are some things, but it's pretty specific, you know, and so for them to have any doubt, it's like this is most contractors love it. And this job we're doing now, the passive house we're building right now, that attic is beautiful because the contractor followed the design to the T. Okay, he may have put one air handler a little bit too far to one side, and now we can't put our dehumidifier duct down the chase. That's okay. We can pivot because I designed it and I'm out in the field and I know what to do now that so if things happen, which he got he understood after that whole experience because we had a conversation, but he understood he's like if there is a reason, everything is exactly where it is. And so for him to do that one shift of like eight inches, it changed our dehumidification plan. You know, the the way we were doing dehumidification, it's fine, it worked out. I didn't make him move it back because I was able to pivot and say, This will still work. I'm gonna do it this way. I prefer it, it's less ductwork anyway. So it worked out, but for everything else, he followed it right off. And yeah, and that's that that process there, like you said, most people, contractors come to value that. I've had guys that say, like when we were doing a lead for homes and they were forced into it and stuff like that, and they'd have to go by the design, you know, it's not their choice, and they're not hired by a builder that said this is what you're gonna do or whatever. Like, they I had guys tell me, I hated you. That's what they would say. I hated you for the longest time, but now I would not do it a different way. Like, I love being able to have a plan in hand, and they're still my clients today, but I've heard had them tell me, you know, like in the beginning, like we hated you because we were forced to do this and we had to follow this plan, and it wasn't our plan, and we couldn't change it, and like everything about it just felt weird to them because it's not the way that they're used to doing business, but once they get inundated into it, it feels like the most natural thing ever. Like we'd never go back, you know, we'd never go back to doing it a different way. So it is a little bit of a learning curve for those guys, but like you said, they do end up loving it a lot of times. We are running up on our time. I got two things I want to do with you real quick here. Uh, I ask every guest at the end of the show to tell us if the world ended today and you had to write a message on the wall, what's the message for the next civilization that may or may not come after you? Be kind. Be kind. I love it. That is a very simple yet potent thing, and if everybody practice it, the world will be a much, much better place for sure. Yeah. I had an anecdote that I was gonna tell about the contractor in the field when I was building. I was trying so hard to be to not be mean to this person. You know, he was an eight back guy. I was like, look, I because I noticed they'd left some stuff, some trash around, and I just wanted them to clean up, and I was trying to be so soft about it. And he turned to me and he says, Dude, be a dick. Tell me to clean my shit up. Oh, is that how it works? And is that really being a dick? Because cleaning shit up is not being a dick. You know what I mean? Like, that's not that's the farthest thing. Like, you want to be a dick? I've seen some of that. I can tell you where to go look for that. Yeah. Okay, man. Thank you very much, Chris, for jumping on. Before we leave, tell everybody where they can find you at. Anything you want to tell any of this audience about how to watch you or find you or or you know, follow you, let them know. Yeah, we're on YouTube and Instagram. Those are our primary spots. Uh, LinkedIn as me, Chris Lummer Giddens. Uh, YouTube is LG Squared, and then uh at Instagram, it's LG Squared underscore Inc. Yeah. Okay, perfect, man. Thank you very much. Uh, this was a rock show of an episode, and I it was a great conversation. We lost track of time. We could have probably kept going for another hour, man. So uh maybe we'll have you back on again at some point. Part two, baby. Take it easy, buddy. Thank you. We'll see you soon. See you, Jeremy. Bye. All right, man.