Insulation: Important in the Summer, Too
Though more often considered a wintertime accoutrement, good insulation is a necessary part of efficient home energy usage all year ’round. As important as keeping the heat inside in the winter, well-insulated walls will be effective at keeping the heat out (and the cool in) during the warm summer months. Happily, there are lots of choices when it comes to keeping your insulation green.
When you think home insulation, the first thing that comes to mind for many of us is a certain pink big cat rolling out bubblegum-colored, candy cotton-like insulation in the attic. We say: don’t think pink! Today’s modern, green insulations are much more sophisticated, and can be much more effective.
1) Recycled paper insulation [www.treehugger.com] is made from 100% waste recycled newsprint and is available both as a roll, or it can be blown into attics or already enclosed sheetrock for added protection. Don’t believe us? Believe the numbers: it has been successfully installed in more than 1 million homes in the UK alone.
2) Hempflax [www.treehugger.com], of the Netherlands, make their insulation batts from mostly hemp fiber, adding some polyester fiber for reinforcing. Soda acts as the fire retardant, and as the hemp is naturally resistant to moths and beetles extra chemical application is avoided.
3) For pure TreeHugger style, Concrete Blond’s customized insulation panels [www.treehugger.com] for domestic spaces might just win our vote. The concrete panels create a false wall, behind which an insulating material can be placed and they are designed to be decorated with your own choice of wallpaper print. We think they’d be a great product for older homes with solid walls which would be difficult to insulate otherwise. We like them for their ability to simply blend in with the domestic space without dominating it or being too gadgety.
4) Denim is a more frequent guest in our clothing category, but recycled denim is typecast no more, thanks to Bonded Logic’s UltraTouch Natural Fiber Insulation [www.treehugger.com], made from 85% post-industrial cotton fiber. Not only is it made from recycled materials, but it is itself 100% recyclable, as well as VOC-free, and formaldehyde-free.
5) Icynene, Procell and Heatlok-Soya are all green in their own way, but one of them takes the cake. Will it be the VOC-free, formaldehyde free system of water-blown policynene that creates an foam blanket of millions of tiny air bubbles, the mix of 100% recycled newspapers, adhesives and fire retardants or the polyurethane foam system made out of recycled plastic (a barrel of Heatlok-soya contains 1000 plastic bottles) and soya oil? Read on [www.treehugger.com] to find out.
