Energy Audit (Houston)

I had one done about a year ago - blower door test and HVAC duct leakage test. Use the same equipment for both tests. As I recall it was $300 for the blower door test and $350 for the HVAC duct leakage test. This was in Baton Rouge.

When they put the house under negative pressure with the blower door test they go around the house with a smoke pen and check for drafts of air entering the house - electrical outlets, crown molding where wall and ceiling plates meet, windows, door jams, etc - areas most common for air infiltration either from outside or the attic. Also go into the attic and point areas that can be addressed for air sealing and insulation.

Some utility companies will pay for a blower test - you just need to go to their web site and check.

Go to this web site and consider buying his book The Home Comfort Book LINK. You can down load a few chapters for free from his web site. I have a copy - chock full of useful info.

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Do you know if using a thermal scope is common for detecting heat infiltration areas?

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Yes it is - the guys I hired did not use a thermal imager, just the smoke pen, but my reason for hiring the company was a little different as I was more interested in total house leakage for HVAC sizing and HVAC duct leakage. But I did learn from the tests that my 30 year old house was tighter than I anticipated but there were areas for improvement, and also my 30- year rigid metal HVAC duct work was much tighter than I expected - in fact he said my results were better than most new home builds on which he ran duct leakage tests (this now required by code on new builds in LA).

Based on your goals I’d certainly try to hire a company that used a good thermal imager in their assessment. I bought a Black&Decker Thermal leak detector on Amazon, $25, from the advice of a poster on the H&G board and it’s OK for identifying “significant” leaks. I’ve thought about buying one of the cheaper Flixr Thermal Imagers or renting one of really good Flixr thermal imagers.