Toronto Condo and Real Estate Blog

The Insurance Industry Has Missed The Mark

By Carson Dunlop

A few months ago, we wrote an article about knob and tube wiring and the over-reaction of the insurance industry to this wiring. Many homebuyers are discovering that insurance companies are not only concerned about knob and tube wiring; they are also worried about 60 amp services.

Is a 60 amp Service Unsafe?

In a word, “No”. A 60 amp service is small by today’s standards; however, it might surprise you to know that a smal house could be built today with a 60 amp service and still comply with modern electrical codes. A 60 amp service comes with 60 amp fuses or a 60 amp breaker. If you draw more than 60 amps, the fuses will blow or the breaker will trip. The fuses or breakers are the brains of the system and they are performing their intended function. They are simply shutting off the power. While this may be inconvenient for the home owner, it is not unsafe.

Electrical Consumption

The biggest users of electricity in a house are things with heating elements. The larger the heating element, the more electricity will be used. In an average home, the stove is the biggest user, followed by the clothes dryer. An electric water heater usually takes third place. If additional large heating elements are found in the house in a sauna or a pottery kiln for example, it is almost impossible to get away with a 60 amp service.

In addition to large heating elements, big electric motors also draw a considerable amount of juice. Air conditioners are prime examples. Therfore, you may find that if a house has a 60 amp service, and has an electric stove and electric clothes dryer, you might not be able to use the two simultaneously. It’s O.K. if you are using one burner, but if you are cooking a turkey dinner with all four burners and the oven on, it’s a bad time to do the laundry.

Many first time buyers however, do not own appliances. If they are buying a house with a 60 amp service, it would be wise to install a gas stove and a gas clothes dryer which draw less electricity. A house with a 60 amp service and gas appliances has almost as much usable electricity as a house with a 100 amp service and an electric stove and electric clothes dryer.

Limited Distribution

Most 60 amp services are found on older systems which have a limited number of circuits. This is a potentially hazardous situation, particularly if the system has fuses rather than breakers. Some homeowners find that their overtaxed distribution system is constantly blowing 15 amp fuses. They replace them with 20, 25 or 30 amp fuses to prevent the fuses from blowing. This is an unsafe condition overheating the wires, and potentially leading to a fire.

The solution to the problem is not necessarily a larger service, but rather a larger distribution system. It is far safer to own a house with a 60 amp service and 24 circuits than a house with a 100 amp service and 6 circuits.

Small appliances with heating elements such as kettles, toasters, irons and hair dryers all draw a considerable amount of electricity for their size. This is why a house with limited distribution system is problematic. If you plug a toaster and kettle into the same circuit, you will draw more than 15 amps and blow the fuse. This would be true regardless of whether the amount of electricity coming into the house is 60 amp, 100 amps or 200 amps. The solution is not a bigger service but more circuits.

In an old house, you might find only six or eight circuits in the entire house. In a new house, you might find that many circuits in the kitchen. As a matter of fact, in a modern Canadian house, the top half and the bottom half of each outlet in the kitchen are on a separate circuit. This explains why you can plug the toaster and kettle into the same outlet without blowing any fuses or tripping any breakers.

So again, the insurance company has missed the mark. They are concentrating on houses with 60 amp services when they should be concentrating on houses with limited distribution systems. We hope this explanation will help them make the connection!

By Carson Dunlop

We encourage clients and real estate agents to call us with technical questions. We get lots of them - and the flavour of the month is condensation.

We don’t want to bore you with technical terms like vapour pressure differential. Let’s keep this simple.

There are two rules at work here:

1) When warm moist air touches something cool, condensation will form.

2) Warm air can hold a lot of moisture; cold air cannot. (While warm air can hold a lot of moisture, it doesn’t necessarily have to. Take a trip to Arizona).

Despite the threats of global warming, it’s still pretty cold outside in the winter. Consequently, windows are cold. If the inner glass surface is extremely cold, condensation (in the form of water or ice) will form, even in a house which has normal indoor humidity. This, believe it or not, is the principle reason for storm windows. The exterior pane of glass provides enough of a buffer zone, that the surface temperature of the interior pane of glass stays warm enough, and condensation is less likely to form.

After doing what we can to raise the temperature of cool surfaces, we should turn our attention to reducing the moisture in the air. The easiest way to maintain low humidity levels is to buy an old house that is not particularly well sealed. Admittedly, the house might be drafty but the drafts mean that cold outside air is sneaking into the house. When that cold air warms up it will have very low humidity. Similarly, warm air that has picked up moisture from cooking, bathing, etc is flushed out of the house.

Unfortunately, this approach flies in the face of current thinking. Modern homes are sealed tightly because every bit of cold air which leaks into a house means that warm air must leak out. This is not efficient.

Another way to get cold dry air into your house is to use up the warm moist air within. In many houses, air from within the house is used by the furnace, hot water tank and fireplace to create combustion and maintain proper draft up the chimney. This warm moist air escapes up the chimney causing cold dry air to enter the house and make up the difference.

Energy efficient homes don’t want to waste this inside air (which you have already paid to heat) by letting it go up the chimney. Consequently, most modern furnaces and fireplaces, bring in outside air for combustion, which increases efficiency.

Taken to the extreme, the most efficient house imaginable would not allow any cold outside air to leak inside nor would it use any inside air for combustion. While the heating bills would be low, the windows would be dripping with condensation and the indoor air quality would be terrible.

The high tech solution is to put in a heat recovery ventilator (also known as an air-to-air heat exchanger). As you exhaust the stale contaminated air from inside the house you replenish it with fresh air from the exterior. While the fresh air and the contaminated air are not allowed to touch one another, the heat from the exhaust air is transferred to the fresh air coming into the house.

In conclusion, condensation within houses requires two major ingredients - humid air and cold surfaces. If you increase the temperature of cold surfaces by adding storm windows and reduce the humidity levels by venting clothes dryers to the exterior, using bathroom and kitchen fans etc., you should be fine. If you still get a little condensation, go to the low tech solution. Open a window!

A Visionary New Green Community at Kennedy and the 401

Tridel is pleased to welcome you to Metrogate, home to what will be the new Scarborough gateway to the City of Toronto. This summer, you can become part of history as a unique area, located just off of the 401 at Kennedy Road, is transformed into a vibrant Naturally Better green community and home to over 2,000 families.

Tridel has carefully planned this future community with an interesting blend of architecture that mixes townhomes and high-rise condos so that there will be a healthy balance of choices, offering something for everyone.

In addition to a location that is close to everything, the Metrogate community will also feature a large central urban park that takes landscaping to an art form with its mixture of flowing water features, sculpted gardens and sophisticated community artwork. There are also plans for a future GO station and extension of the Sheppard subway line, for added convenience.

Tridel has left no planning detail to chance and has provided an extraordinary condo community that will support the needs of the residents; all constructed with the latest state-of-the-art sustainable, green technologies to ensure that the Metrogate community is truly “built for life”.

One thing is for sure. Metrogate will be both a landmark and a destination….a neighbourhood like Scarborough has never seen before.

Metrogate: Built Green. Built for Life

As the largest builder of sustainable condos in the GTA, Tridel is committed to building communities that are environmentally responsible, energy efficient, and healthy places to live. Naturally Better communities are high-performing, meaning they use less energy to run while providing superior comfort to the home-owner. In turn, homeowners pay less money to operate the building and their own condo suites.

Tridel’s Naturally Better communities are healthier places to live than conventional condos. Materials are chosen that have the lowest possible off-gassing chemicals, and technically advanced ventilation systems are in place to allow residents to breathe clean and fresh air. Living in a Tridel “Naturally better” building helps homeowners reduce their ecological footprint by avoiding, on average, at least one tonne of greenhouse gas emissions per year.

In recognition to their commitment to the environment, Tridel is proud to be the recipient of the City of Toronto 2006 Green Award for Energy Conservation.

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Contact the Jeffrey Team for more information