Determining where failures will occur can save a contractor and owner loss in revenues and help prevent costly litigation. The question of when to conduct a building enclosure thermal analysis scan can truly be a billion-dollar question when avoiding loss of profits due to failures and rework in our construction industry. Although many still do not see thermography as a quantifiable performance testing tool, to identify and troubleshoot common issues during construction, the benefits of thermography are demonstrating otherwise.During this course case studies will be used to show how thermography can be a valuable tool for inspecting and performing non-destructive testing of building components, when identifying problems as a result of air infiltration/exfiltration, water infiltration through the building enclosure, as well as complementing other performance tests methods. We will present how a properly trained thermographer can identify areas where air infiltration is present within the wall system and at penetrations and transitions typically affecting the building airtightness resulting in energy leakage/loss. Representative data and anomalies examples from forensic projects and thermography analysis will be presented to demonstrate best practices when conducting performance tests, as well as show how this quantifiable testing method can aid in troubleshooting issues during construction.

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