Kelly: (00:06 )
Welcome to buildings and beyond.

Robb: (00:09 )
the podcast that explores how we can create a more sustainable built environment.

Kelly: (00:13 )
by focusing on efficiency, accessibility and health.

Robb: (00:18 )
I’m Robb Aldrich.

Kelly: (00:19 )
and I’m Kelly Westby. Kristof is the principle of positive energy in Austin. Their mission is to transform the way conditioned space is delivered to society. They offer residential outcome focused design engineering services for robust mechanical systems as well as off-grid power and water systems. Kristof was also the chair of AIA Austin’s building enclosure committee. He has been involved in several ASHRAE committees including physiology and human environment, thermal comfort, ventilation and IAQ as well as RESNET standards development committee. I first learned about Kristof through the building science podcast which he hosts. We wanted to bring him on our show because of his focus on human centered design. We discussed two main topics in the episode, human psychology related to decision making and the impact of damp indoor environments on human physiology. If you are considering skipping this, because I’m” an engineer and I’m not interested in psychology, I know everything I need to know about mold,” Stop right there. This episode is particularly for you. But first a quick aside, my cohost Rob wants you all to join him at the 2019 us symposium series for a deep dive into issues and opportunities around electrification in the Northeast. The symposium is brought to you by the Northeast energy efficiency partnerships, the Northeast States for coordinated air use management and the electric power research Institute. Pathways to de-carbonization in the Northeast will be held August 27th to 29th at the Marriott Brooklyn bridge in Brooklyn, New York. The event will convene leaders from government, industry, community and advocacy to address opportunities, trends, and challenges of minimizing the carbon footprint for homes, buildings, and transportation in the Northeast. U S check out the link in our show notes for more details. Now let’s get back to hot and humid buildings and humans in Austin, Texas.

Kelly: (02:15 )
So welcome Kristof to the buildings and beyond podcast.

Kristof: (02:19 )
Thank you.

Kelly: (02:19 )
And thanks for agreeing to meet me here in this WeWork in beautiful Barton Springs in Austin.

Kristof: (02:26 )
My pleasure.

Kelly: (02:27 )
And today we wanted to talk a little bit, I’ll give a little, give a little background about you in the intro, but we’re going to kind of dive into the, I think what people call the softer sides of engineering and building science, which is the psychology and physiology kind of parts of humans. I know you talk a lot about this. So maybe just give us a little background. How did you start to become interested in human physiology and how it relates to building science and where do you see the industry needs to maybe make a pivot around, around that?

Kristof: (03:06 )
Great. So I’m a problem solver as we all are. I think in the back, at least the back of our minds. And I recognize that we’re putting a lot of energy and resources into buildings. And coming out of a background at several national labs, I was a research scientist where we put a lot of inputs in to get the output that we want, right? So I started to think about, well, what’s the output of a home or an apartment? And it’s actually you and it’s actually me. It’s a healthy, productive member of society. That’s what these inputs we put in- electricity and freshwater and data today and gas and the other inputs and then the outputs are the black water and gray water, things like that. But really the fundamental output is you, the content of your mind and the key in the fact that you’re in a healthy body. And so that’s how I got into it.

Kelly: (04:06 )
Yeah. Reframing basically, we’re not building buildings for the sake of the building, but for housing our individuals. That’s really interesting. I was just at a house warming the other day, which was the opening of a multifamily building. And someone said something along the lines of, if we’re not focusing on the humans that are interacting with the building and living in the building, then what are we doing?

Kristof: (04:35 )
Yeah. It’s all sort of ego trips otherwise.

Kelly: (04:38 )
Yeah. Right. Can I make the biggest or the smartest or whatever building. Yeah.

Kristof: (04:44 )
Really, did you build the building to take pictures of it and get it on house? Is that really what it was?

Kelly: (04:51 )
Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And so talk to me a little bit about, we sort of chatted a little bit in the beginning, but about the invisible and how we as a society, but also in our in