Home Improvement Blog Improving Your Home And Your Life

One of the most important behind-the-scenes elements of your home is insulation. This is a material that is used in order to keep the temperatures in your home at a natural level which is easier for you to live in .

The most typical forms of insulation available are rigid sheets, flexible blankets, and loose fill. All of these items might be composed of fiberglass or other such materials. Some of the most common materials are rock wool fibers, cellulose (paper) fibers, and a variety of foams. Specialized insulation, which is intended to reduce solar heat gain or air and water infiltration, is sold in plastic or metallized plastic sheets.

Building a Barrier
What insulation really is can be compared to putting extra clothes on, or throwing an extra blanket on the bed. You are getting an unmoving layer of heat and air in between the inside and the outside, which is going to allow you to have a better control and handle on the temperature in the room or in the house. Reflective insulation, which means exactly what it sounds like, will reflect the heat back towards the heat source. This means that instead of escaping out of your home, it will instead be reflected back into your home. Typically made of foil, treated paper or plastic film, reflective insulation becomes a radiant barrier when used alone and facing an open space. Reflective barriers can be used under roofing to prevent solar heat gains in warm climates or below floor joists to retain winter heat.

The Value of Insulation
Insulation is very important because heat will always leave the area it is in and travel to an area that is colder. Therefore, if you can keep the heat from leaving your home and going outside, you are going to be able to keep your home warmer and therefore save heating costs.
In order to determine how well a type of insulation is going to work in your home, take a look at its R-Value. The R-value is proportional to the insulation's thickness, and varies depending on the type of insulating material. An inch of fiberglass blanket or batt has an average R-value of 3.2, while the R-value of loose-fill cellulose is about 3.5 per inch. Sprayed-on polyurethane foam tips the scales at an average R-value of 5.9. The overall R-value of a building has a critical impact on home energy consumption. The U.S. Department of Energy reports that an average home spends up to 70 percent of its energy consumption on heating and cooling. Higher home R-values mean greater efficiency as well as comfort.
Keeping air from moving really matters, since even a small draft can reduce insulation's efficiency. DuPont claims that air infiltration can drop a wall's isolative value from an installed rating of R-13 to a performance value of R-5. Manufacturers have addressed this problem by offering air infiltration barriers, commonly referred to as house wraps or building wrap, to shield insulation from moving air. These barriers are often designed to combat water infiltration as well, a liability that can seriously impair your insulation's efficiency.

Other products can team with insulation to make the entire building envelope more energy efficient and the conditioned indoor space more livable. These would include products like spray foam sealants, electrical cover plate gaskets, and hot water pipe covers. Doors and windows are obvious partners, but so are their less visible counterparts like caulking and weather-stripping. These energy-saving components can be installed over the weekend and will help boost your home's overall thermal performance immediately.

Where to Put It
Remember that when you are installing insulation, you are making sure that your home will retain its heat to the best of its potential. Always remember that you should usually put your insulation in the interior cavities or on the rough surfaces of the exterior walls, and covered with finish materials such as drywall. Certainly homeowners doing new construction and remodeling work have the greatest number of insulating options, since their buildings are wide open. Insulation products, however, are just one piece in the building-wide approach to energy efficiency.