The pictures below are of 2 different basements, taken on May 15th. The top left shows water stains in the cold cellar, and is indicative of what’s happening in the entire basement. The water has wicked almost 6 feet up from the slab! The picture at the top right shows a little pond collecting below the blanket insulation and is joined by a series of other little ponds around the whole basement perimeter. This basement was built to OBC, with no additional water management strategies in place.
The picture on the right is of a basement (at the same stage of construction as those above) where the builder installed a capillary break between footing and foundation walls and lapped the drainage layer over the top of the footing. There was no sign of dampness or moisture anywhere in the basement.
Einstein was quoted as saying, “Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” You don’t have to be Einstein to see this difference.
