Sweating Summer Slab Mitigation. – GreenBuildingAdvisor

Hi folks,

I’m a carpenter here in Maine. I have a client whose lakeside camp (summer cottage) is built on a concrete slab. No flooring, just carpet on the concrete. He complains that in the summer, water condenses on the slab making his carpet wet, and probably causing damage to the sill plate.

It looks to me like this slab was poured without any stem walls, either directly on the dirt, or more likely, a combination of earth and shale. What’s the best way to mitigate the problem at this point? I believe the moisture is coming from interior condensation since this occurs in the summer (the cool thermal mass of the slab collecting moisture). That said, I can’t be 100% certain since there appears to be no vapor barrier.