Wild Alternatives To Traditional Windows That Reduce Energy Waste Dramatically
Posted on: 15 May 2015
There are certainly quite a few windows out there that help to lower your energy costs. These include using traditional eco-friendly windows which can reduce your energy expenditure by as much as $500 per year. But if you want to go more extreme than that, then you will need to go with some more radical window designs. Here are some examples of some sharp departures from traditional window designs in order to maximize energy savings.
Vacuum Windows
The truth is that any time you have any medium in a window, energy can travel through it. But vacuum is essentially the lack of a medium. These types of windows create an air vacuum in the middle of a window that makes it much more difficult for heat to travel through it.
It's been estimated that people who install vacuum glass into their buildings would reduce UV rays by 99.9% at a minimum. Heat just has a difficult time moving over spaces with no air in them. This is why the energy is cut so dramatically as the heat has to go around the frame or lose a lot of its energy moving through the space of pure vacuum sealed air.
All Glass and Polyurethane Windows
New innovations in window design are allowing for polyurethane windows that have glass-reinforcement. So instead of using traditional approaches like aluminum for the frame, this is being substituted with just more glass.
In fact, the windows are apparently often as much as 80 percent glass when you check this based on weight. Apparently, the windows weight around as much as aluminum windows with one key difference.
The thermal conductivity for the frames of these windows is 400 times less than that of traditional aluminum. The material is also much harder than other traditional approaches like PVC, where it can be as much as 40 times harder.
The window also has the advantage of maintaining its stability without having to other materials that aren't especially eco-friendly like steel. This is due to the fact that steel can be hard to recycle and energy intensive in its creation.
In contrast, glass is easy to recycle and relatively easy to produce. Despite the radically different approach to windows that use largely all glass even in the frame, these windows still have standard production values. This means it doesn't cost much more energy to create them with the screwing, mill and drilling needed. For further assistance, contact an outlet, such as Simpson Windows and Doors.
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