DAYTONA BEACH, Fla., April 12, 2012 /PRNewswire via COMTEX/ -- Masco Home Services, Inc. has announced that it has entered into collaboration with BASF Corporation on a new sustainable residential construction program - BEYOND Applied Building Science - that can help homebuilders construct homes that outperform conventional, code-built homes. The program combines high-performance BASF products and Masco Home Services' Environments For Living® program's advanced principles of building science into a program for builders that can benefit homebuyers.

The BEYOND Applied Building Science program is an initiative of the BASF Center for Building Excellence in North America that offers consulting, plan reviews and other services to assist builders in constructing homes that outperform conventional code-built homes. The program is offered in collaboration with Masco Home Services and its Environments For Living program, which provides testing and certification services for the BEYOND requirements, as well as home buyer marketing benefits including five-year limited guarantees* on heating and cooling energy use and comfort.

"For almost a decade, the Environments For Living program has been helping homebuilders gain advantages through building science, and we are delighted to offer our services and homeowner limited guarantees to support the new BEYOND program from BASF," said Dave Bell, Director of Building Science for Masco Home Services.

The collaboration also expands the benefits available under the Environments For Living program which consolidates the most advanced techniques of applied building science and provides tiered levels of certification for energy efficiency for heating and cooling the home that include heating and cooling energy usage and comfort guarantees. In addition, this program establishes requirements for tight construction, improved thermal systems, right-sized HVAC systems, fresh air ventilation, balanced air pressure, internal moisture management, and combustion safety.

Every home built to the BEYOND requirements must achieve a Home Energy Rating System (HERS®) Index score of 50 or lower, which means it requires at least 50 percent less energy than a conventional, code-built home. All homes must be tested for envelope and duct tightness and air pressure, and comply with specific measures to control bulk water and vapor. Special BASF points may be earned for use of high-performance products that contain BASF chemistry.

"The goal of the BEYOND Applied Building Science program is to stimulate adoption of sustainable, beyond-code construction that is affordable, measurable and provides lasting value," said Rick Davenport, BASF Director of Sustainable Construction in North America. "Builders are already seeing evidence that sustainability is central to the future of the industry -- from increasingly stringent building codes to homeowner expectations for energy efficiency -- and BASF is committed to helping them affordably respond to those trends."

Masco Home Services, Inc. and the Environments For Living programMasco Home Services, Inc., a Masco company, is an innovative leader in home performance and creating energy-efficient, comfortable homes. Headquartered in Daytona Beach, Florida, the company serves both homeowners and residential builders through the Environments For Living® and Environments For Living Certified Green® programs.

Focusing exclusively on new home construction, the Environments For Living and Environments For Living Certified Green programs offer national, turnkey home performance solutions to residential builders. These programs help builders construct more energy-efficient, comfortable and durable homes than homes built under conventional methods, using the principles of building science. Since 2001, the Environments For Living program has been key in the construction of more than 160,000 energy-efficient, comfortable and durable new homes. Find out more at www.environmentsforliving.com .

The HERS Index score is a scoring system established by Residential Energy Services Network (RESNET), a third party, in which a score of 100 is what a standard new home built to code would score, while a score of 0 is a new home that has net-zero energy use. Masco Home Services, Inc. does not guarantee the actual HERS Index score for the home as built. The HERS® Index is a registered trademark of RESNET.