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> If your house is 25f, put on a couple sweaters and a coat and have a beer. It’s not the end of the world. Houses were designed very differently 150 years ago

> If your house is 25f, put on a couple sweaters and a coat and have a beer. It’s not the end of the world. Houses were designed very differently 150 years ago. Lower roofs, fewer windows, huge thick drapes or tapestries on the walls, animal skins or carpets on the floors. 9 ft windows (double pane or not) on all walls is going to leak out a lot of heat. Most importantly, fireplaces. Houses had fireplaces, and rooms were designed around a central fireplace to keep everyone warm.

deleted 6y ago
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Gwypaas 6y ago
Nope, simply bad housing standards leading to no isolation. Passive houses work in the Scandinavia. This is coming from a Swede who lived for a while in Texan suburbia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passive_house https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passive_house
- falcolas 6y ago
  You can definitely get a passive house in the US; but it's fairly expensive and takes quite a bit of time to pay off. It also requires somewhat specialized (read: niche and expensive) heating and cooling equipment, since there is so little air movement into and out of the house, and requires so little energy. Oh, and ironically, when the power's out in a passive house, you need to open a window to ensure you don't over-humidify the house with your breath.
- bjoli 6y ago
  Just better building standards will get you a long way. I live in a house with rather poor energy rating by Swedish standards (E on an A to F scale), yet with 4 people and some sunshine we keep 75m2 (half the house) heated to 20c with -5c outside.
lurquer 6y ago
You clearly haven't been in many 150 year old West Texas houses. Good lord... The spread of AC in the 1930s resulted in everything in Texas being insulated out the wazoo. Your typical suburban home in Texas -- with no electricity -- is perfectly habitable without power. Its an inconvenience, to be sure. But, all this handwringing over a freak -- and fun -- event is laughable. Want to fret? Fret about floods, tornadoes, hurricanes... those events leave people without housing altogether. But, an ice storm and some snow? Gimme a break. If you were stranded in the wilderness in 3f temperatures and stumbled upon a typical suburban home without power but well-stocked with blankets, clothes, frozen food, comfy mattresses, bags of charcoal, a grill, flashlights, candles, and a new package of Oreo cookies, you would shout for joy. "We're saved!! Shelter! Thank God!"
- ulisesrmzroche 6y ago
  You obviously don’t live anywhere near texas. No houses have insulation for this kind of weather. It’s like if I went to Canada and started shitting on people unable to deal with 110f weather without electricity .
  - lurquer 6y ago
    Ha. I live deep in the heart of the Lone Star State. Don't make assumptions, buttercup.
    - ulisesrmzroche 6y ago
      Doubt it. But keep on shitting on people going through a severe weather disaster to make yourself feel better. Guess you really need it
  - 8note 6y ago
    Insulation works in both directions. If you use AC a lot in summer, the same insulation is doing you good Without adding heat, you're still not going to stay warm for long though. my window may have been bent so it couldn't close in winter throughout child hood, but we still had a heater on. Watch out for your windows. Hanging stuff to act like curtains will help
falcolas 6y ago
I imagine plumbing contractors in Texas are rubbing their hands together in glee. Frozen, broken pipes everywhere.
- conductr 6y ago
  It’s going to take months to get to everyone too. Contractors here are busy enough as it is.
byecomputer 6y ago
My house is 140 years old and it's a sieve with 12 ft ceilings & 9 ft windows... in Iowa.
- ghaff 6y ago
  I have about a 200 yo house in Massachusetts. I've had a lot of work done to tighten it up but it still is very drafty in many spots. It has smallish windows and low ceilings but it's definitely not what you would call well-insulated overall.
Johnny555 6y ago
I'd be surprised if a 150 year old house was insulated and sealed as well as a 20 year old house, even in Texas. Though you're right that the old house likely had a wood burning heat source, but I'd imagine that there were times when wood was scarce. And that 150 year old fireplace would have sucked air out of the house, bringing in cold air through every air gap. I looked it up, and wood has an R-value of around 1.4 per inch, so a log cabin with 6" walls would have an R-value of around R8, current building codes in Texas specify R15 for walls, R38 for roofs. Single-pane windows have an R-value of around R1, energy efficient double panes, around R4 (triple paned can hit R9) so even though there are a lot more windows in a modern house, they have better insulation.
bjoli 6y ago
We had a heater outage recently, with temperatures at about -20c. More than half the house was heated by our fireplace. It churns out something like 7kw when used properly, which is more than enough for that part of the house. The other part was fine with one 2kw heater for the night. The whole thing was pretty scary. I'll make sure our next house has 2 fireplaces. One m3 of firewood will keep you going for a couple of days, and more importantly: your pipes won't crack.
ghaff 6y ago
They had wood burning heat sources and they didn't have indoor running water. So, as you say, people could gather around fireplace(s) and there were no actual issues associated with the rest of the house being cold. But for those being very casual about other people sitting around in 25 degree temperatures, that's actually fairly chilly especially if you don't have the clothing and bed coverings for it. And I say that as someone who lives in New England and has done winter camping. Could I manage modulo piping concerns? Sure. (And I know you can drain pipes but I'd hate to be in a situation where I felt I had to do so in an emergency situation without electricity and then fire things up again when the electricity came back on.) But you're talking about huddling under covers if you don't have wood burning heat.

deleted 6y ago

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Gwypaas 6y ago

Nope, simply bad housing standards leading to no isolation. Passive houses work in the Scandinavia. This is coming from a Swede who lived for a while in Texan suburbia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passive_house https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passive_house

falcolas 6y ago
You can definitely get a passive house in the US; but it's fairly expensive and takes quite a bit of time to pay off. It also requires somewhat specialized (read: niche and expensive) heating and cooling equipment, since there is so little air movement into and out of the house, and requires so little energy. Oh, and ironically, when the power's out in a passive house, you need to open a window to ensure you don't over-humidify the house with your breath.
bjoli 6y ago
Just better building standards will get you a long way. I live in a house with rather poor energy rating by Swedish standards (E on an A to F scale), yet with 4 people and some sunshine we keep 75m2 (half the house) heated to 20c with -5c outside.

lurquer 6y ago

You clearly haven't been in many 150 year old West Texas houses. Good lord... The spread of AC in the 1930s resulted in everything in Texas being insulated out the wazoo. Your typical suburban home in Texas -- with no electricity -- is perfectly habitable without power. Its an inconvenience, to be sure. But, all this handwringing over a freak -- and fun -- event is laughable. Want to fret? Fret about floods, tornadoes, hurricanes... those events leave people without housing altogether. But, an ice storm and some snow? Gimme a break. If you were stranded in the wilderness in 3f temperatures and stumbled upon a typical suburban home without power but well-stocked with blankets, clothes, frozen food, comfy mattresses, bags of charcoal, a grill, flashlights, candles, and a new package of Oreo cookies, you would shout for joy. "We're saved!! Shelter! Thank God!"

ulisesrmzroche 6y ago
You obviously don’t live anywhere near texas. No houses have insulation for this kind of weather. It’s like if I went to Canada and started shitting on people unable to deal with 110f weather without electricity .
- lurquer 6y ago
  Ha. I live deep in the heart of the Lone Star State. Don't make assumptions, buttercup.
  - ulisesrmzroche 6y ago
    Doubt it. But keep on shitting on people going through a severe weather disaster to make yourself feel better. Guess you really need it
- 8note 6y ago
  Insulation works in both directions. If you use AC a lot in summer, the same insulation is doing you good Without adding heat, you're still not going to stay warm for long though. my window may have been bent so it couldn't close in winter throughout child hood, but we still had a heater on. Watch out for your windows. Hanging stuff to act like curtains will help

falcolas 6y ago

I imagine plumbing contractors in Texas are rubbing their hands together in glee. Frozen, broken pipes everywhere.

conductr 6y ago
It’s going to take months to get to everyone too. Contractors here are busy enough as it is.

byecomputer 6y ago

My house is 140 years old and it's a sieve with 12 ft ceilings & 9 ft windows... in Iowa.

ghaff 6y ago
I have about a 200 yo house in Massachusetts. I've had a lot of work done to tighten it up but it still is very drafty in many spots. It has smallish windows and low ceilings but it's definitely not what you would call well-insulated overall.

Johnny555 6y ago

I'd be surprised if a 150 year old house was insulated and sealed as well as a 20 year old house, even in Texas. Though you're right that the old house likely had a wood burning heat source, but I'd imagine that there were times when wood was scarce. And that 150 year old fireplace would have sucked air out of the house, bringing in cold air through every air gap. I looked it up, and wood has an R-value of around 1.4 per inch, so a log cabin with 6" walls would have an R-value of around R8, current building codes in Texas specify R15 for walls, R38 for roofs. Single-pane windows have an R-value of around R1, energy efficient double panes, around R4 (triple paned can hit R9) so even though there are a lot more windows in a modern house, they have better insulation.

bjoli 6y ago

We had a heater outage recently, with temperatures at about -20c. More than half the house was heated by our fireplace. It churns out something like 7kw when used properly, which is more than enough for that part of the house. The other part was fine with one 2kw heater for the night. The whole thing was pretty scary. I'll make sure our next house has 2 fireplaces. One m3 of firewood will keep you going for a couple of days, and more importantly: your pipes won't crack.

ghaff 6y ago

They had wood burning heat sources and they didn't have indoor running water. So, as you say, people could gather around fireplace(s) and there were no actual issues associated with the rest of the house being cold. But for those being very casual about other people sitting around in 25 degree temperatures, that's actually fairly chilly especially if you don't have the clothing and bed coverings for it. And I say that as someone who lives in New England and has done winter camping. Could I manage modulo piping concerns? Sure. (And I know you can drain pipes but I'd hate to be in a situation where I felt I had to do so in an emergency situation without electricity and then fire things up again when the electricity came back on.) But you're talking about huddling under covers if you don't have wood burning heat.