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SHOPPER'S GUIDE to Special Deals in:

INSULATION

Retail stores and the web are largely limited to selling the less efficient types of insulation. You may, as discussed in the story at right, have to do some searching to learn more and do better.

Here though is an exception:

1. BARGAINS: You can buy just about anything on eBay, including used insulation. A truckload! Enough for a large house. Price: $5,175 for polyiso boards, the most energy efficient. Deals come and go. A quick click here will tell you the latest. Another web site - Insulation Depot - specializes in truckloads of used insulation. It always has something, including a truckload of polyiso for $5,175, but slight different dimensions. (Both sites claim the price is 70% less than retail). For Depot details click here.

2. NATURAL: The only solution for buyers who want more efficient insulation than cellulose blown-in, but don't like the idea of being surrounded by derivatives of fossil fuels is soybean-based foam insulation in structural insulated panels and spray form. Three soybean-based spray foam insulation manufacturers are BioBased, UrethaneSoy and Emega. (Biobased says that its insulation is 96% soy). Contact companies for dealers and contractors in your area, like Econo-Therm in New York.

A company that produces structural insulated panels with soybean - from Biobased - is eSips.

Getting Aggressive About Energy Savings

Your home's envelope is the first and perhaps most important place to look for making a home into a zero energy user.

Heating and cooling are by far the biggest energy users in the home. They account for 56% of the total, according to the Department of Energy. Your bill for contributing to global warming as you heat and cool your home may come to more than $1,000 annually, but the news isn't all bad.

Efficiency Gains: 50% or More

You've got a one, two counterpunch. Better boilers, furnaces, pumps and central air are one way to attack the problems and that's discussed on the next page over. However, first see how you may get some of your greatest efficiencies - cuts of 50% or more in your heating and cooling energy use - just from how your home's shell or envelope is built.

Passive solar design is the answer. Here it will be taken broadly to mean getting the best use of your HVAC (i.e. heating, ventilation, air-conditioning) equipment's output, as well as that of the sun's heat by how a house is oriented and insulated, including the type, size, placement and number of windows.

Economical, Quiet, Dry and Strong

Cost is another reason to look at the house itself for ways to reduce the energy bill and carbon footprint. Highly energy efficient insulation and windows are among the cheapest ways to cut energy costs and the right passive solar design may lead to a shell that is cheaper to build than putting up a home which is designed without considering the sun's arc.

Whatever the cost, the money spent on making the home's envelope energy efficient is well spent for many reasons. It will also result in a house that is quieter, better built, better ventilated, drier and less susceptible to swings in temperature than one that isn't built with zero energy in mind.

How much money you spend and how much energy you save from how your shell is built depends on many factors, like the climate you live in and whether a home is an existing one or is about to be built. With an existing home, your passive solar design change options are limited. A house's orientation and windows are basically set in place, so owners or buyers of existing homes can really only achieve greater energy efficiency from their home's shell through their choice of more energy efficient insulation, windows and other reasonable structural upgrades.

Since more than 98% of the single-family housing stock is made up of homes already occupied insulation and windows will be covered before orientation, including landscaping and building materials. New homes still count though. Half the mid-century housing stock has yet to be built.

Choosing the type of insulation is not enough though. You have to also decide how much you're going to need where and that varies depending on where in the house it's being installed. As shown at right, the order of heat gain (in summer) and loss (in winter) is - from highest to lowest - as follows: ceiling, walls, floor.

Windows require a different set of choices. When upgrading, you might choose different types for different sides. For a new house, you should also consider the number of windows and size as well.

Insulation: Foam Sprayed, Boarded or Paneled

Any hope of getting to zero energy is likely to include the word foam in any talk of insulation, though don't expect to see much bubbling. The foam is mostly solid polysyllablic stuff. Think plastic packing peanuts and Styrofoam cups.

(Foam is not perfect. It has carbon emissions problem because it's a petroleum-based product. However, it may be recyclable.)

"Does the house have foam insulation?"

"Do you install foam insulation?"

Foam does the job of keeping air from getting in or out of the house better than any other type of commercially-available insulation. Another reason to beat the drum on foam over other types of insulation is that it helps to build your search around a simple concept.

Insulation may be the most difficult improvement to make. It's a lot of work. No two jobs are alike. You often have to find builders and contractors who can do the job you want done. That can be especially hard too when choosing foam because it isn't used as much as other types of insulation.

It's also difficult to decide how much you need and the prices you'll have to pay when so much depends on your particular situation (i.e. size and style of home, location, etc.). But you have to start somewhere, so here's a basic rundown on the variety of foams that are available and, if you click here, a way to find insulation contractors you can talk to about installing insulation:

• Spray Foam Insulation is one of the best insulations and can be used in existing homes or homes under construction (though the latter is always easier to do because workers are free of any residents). It's commonly referred to as SPF, virtually taking for granted that the foam is made of polyurethane, the most likely choice. A soybean-based foam with similar properties and mixed to varying degrees with polyurethane is becoming widely available. SPF may be open or closed cell. The latter provides stronger insulation, but is not necessarily right for every use. Installing spray foam or rather applying it is best left to professionals.

  You may find spray foam contractors at sprayfoam.org and sprayfoam.com. Still, the equipment and supplies needed to do the job are available in home supply stores or through Web suppliers, like Fomo for the true do-it-yourselfers at about half the cost ($.90/board feet).

  The stuff is sprayed on and expands a smooth white mass over every surface, including joints, wires and pipes, and into every crevice. It's so good it does double duty as a sealant and that's no small advantage. It's said there's a 1/2 mile of cracks in the average-sized house. Another plus is that when it's finished expanding it drys solid and so adds to the strength of the house's structure. While it can be used everywhere, foam varieties below may work better for existing foundations and wherever insulation is used in new homes.
• Structural Insulated Panels (SIP) are for new homes only. They're factory-built panels made of foam hardened into large sheets (i.e. 8' x 24') sandwiched between building material, then trucked to the home site and assembled like Legos to create the house's shell (i.e. mimimal framing). A variation on the theme are insulated concrete panels (ICP) which come off second best in insulation reviews. SIP comes with choice of foams. Polyiso has an edge over polyurethane and polystyrene, which is what packing peanuts and Styrofoam cups are made from. SIP has the best potential for reducing heating and cooling bills.

  You can find SIP contractors from the SIPA web site.

  Homes built with SIP are virtually airtight and need ventilation systems. The cost of the panels is also the highest, especially when you have to figure in the expense of the ventilation system. However, labor costs are much less since it goes up fast and no skilled workers are needed to do the job - though your SIP contractor better be skilled in assembling SIP homes. Estimates on what your net costs vary from an additional 5% added onto the price of the house down to zero (i.e. the money your saving on labor can change greatly from one region of the country to another, while the cost of SIP won't).
• Rigid Foam Insulation are 1' to 4' x 8' boards mostly for new homes where they are attached to a traditional wood frame.

  Here's a list of polyiso manufacturers who can point you in the direction of contractors and dealers of polyiso board insulation. For example, Bruce Hall Corp., a New York dealer, sells a Dow (R-6.5) 2' x 8' board for $15.98.

  Best bet in existing home: roof or attic. Same plastic choices as SIP: polyiso, polyurethane and polystyrene. The last is the cheapest to buy and by far the most widely available. It can be found in most home supply stores, but it's the least effective board insulation and won't save you as much money as polyiso will over the long run. All boards used in the roof work best at keeping heat in or out with radiant barriers (i.e. aluminum foil) attached to them.

Some other types of insulation:

• Blown insulation is a cheaper, less effective version of foam. A professional blows it into the walls etc. out of a hose connected to vacuum cleaner-looking machine and it covers everything. Never hardens though and may settle over time, like finding sagging border fences. Main material coming out of hose is fiberglass, a cheap, abundant natural material that's recyclable. That it's a natural product is a plus over the foam poly's. Better still is recycled newsprint, which is turned into cellulose. More earth-friendly, more efficient than fiberglass, but much harder to find and more expensive. You'll have a more difficult time reaching zero energy with cellulose, but it's included here for it's earth-friendliness.
• Batts, blankets and rolls made of inches thick starchy-like material is what you'll find in most American homes. It's the cheapest and easiest to install, routinely installed by homeowners themselves. Still, not easy to install right. Squeeze here. Miss a corner there and it's only better than nothing. Hiring professionals is no guarantee of a better job. They've been known to literally leave gapping holes, like under a bathtub, or simply not install the insulation called for in the building plans. Maybe they just forget. Who's going to know? Even done right batts are the least effective insulation in keeping heat in or out of a home. Batts can be bought in almost any home supply store and you have several choices of material, but expect that stores will only carry fiberglass.

Ironically, fiberglass is seen as the premier insulation material when the subject turns to window frames. More on that later.

The Secret of Quantity

Americans know precious little about insulation and what they know or think they know they don't like. In 2001 study done by the Department of Energy's Energy Information Administration, researchers threw up their hands trying to find out the facts on insulation in homes and went with the opinions of the home owners they surveyed. What they found is that some 60% of U.S. homeowners said their homes were not "well insulated". As for the rest, they may want to reconsider because things are not what they seem.

Law of diminishing returns: maximum R-60

While insulation comes in many forms and materials, it's all judged by the same lone standard known as its R-value. The 'R' stands for resistance and when a number is attached to it that indicates how good the insulation is at resisting the flow of heat. As the graph on the right shows, the range is broad. Almost anything will give you some resistance (i.e. remember snow, Eskimos and igloos?), while it's virtually impossible to stop heat dead. Still, you're heating and cooling is safe with R-60. Less than 2% of the heat is getting through hourly with insulation at that value.

In theory any type of insulation will get you there. Each type of insulation is rated and assigned an R-value indicating the amount of heat transfer resistance it has per inch. They range from 2-4 for fiberglass batts to 5-7 for spray foam to 5-8 for SIP and boards. All that would be needed to get to R-60 then would be to stack enough batts or polyiso boards together - typically, each 1 or 2 inches thick - or spray enough foam to reach 60. With R-3/inch fiberglass batts 20 inches will do the trick, while 10 inches of R-6/inch spray foam will do the job and 8 inches of R-8/inch SIP will get you there.

It's that simple and it's that wrong. The R value/inch is determined in labs, but that has nothing to do with reality. The Oak Ridge National Laboratory, a Federal agency, came up with one standard that does and calls it the Whole Wall R-value. Not too catchy a name and you'll probably never see it anywhere, but accepted as more accurate than the plain R-value you'll find attached to just about any insulation. Whole Wall isn't a number that stands still either. It changes with circumstances, but when you calculate (i.e. click for calculator) enough of them you find out that it takes much more batts and blown to get the insulation you're expecting. This is not the case with any of the foams. Their R-value/inch and Whole Wall R-valve/inch match up well, but the fiberglass batts may be way off - perhaps having a Whole Wall R-value/inch that may be half as much as its R-value/inch.

U.S. Homes Insulation: Needing 5 Times as Much?

Since fiberglass batts are even less effective than their generally billed to be, so is the insulation of American homes. That's because fiberglass batts are what you'll find in the majority of American homes, according to Freedonia, an insulation research firm.

It gets worse. The difference between what American homes are required to have and what the Department of Energy says they need to have is vast. The first map below shows the state building codes for insulation. Builders are guided by codes and you can expect to find insulation that meets code in the house. No more. No less. The international 2009 code (i.e. dark green) is the top code and as you can see only California and Florida reach that high. (Click here and scroll to "Residential", then click to see your state).

Now, take a look at what the standards are for the 2006 IECC codes (i.e. click here and scroll) and compare them with what the R-values are in the colorful table below the second map. These are the R-values the Department of Energy, which is the leading driver promoting zero energy, thinks homes should have. It's a big gap between code and recommended levels made much bigger because of the lower Whole Wall R-values of fiberglass batts that are found in most American homes.

For example, the 2006 code calls for R-13 in most walls, while the DOE says that should be the minimum and goes as high as R-21. So your terrific builder is flawless in installing the most R-4/in. batts in the 2" x 4" framing of your house that he can. In practice, that's just a depth in the wall of 3.5" (i.e. what the 4 is actually). Okay, so when you multiply 3.5 and 4 you get 14. You've met code with room to spare, but still not what you need and that presumes perfection in the installation. Have anything less or your builder installs an R-3 or R-2 batt - you're going to know? - and meeting code for the inspectors might actually result in a failing low single digit grade. And that's with the 2006 codes. Overall, with many Americans having below 2006 code level insulation, Americans could need 3 to 5 times as much insulation as they have - if they have insulation at all.

Even if you could get the right amount of batting to reach the DOE levels, as you may be able to in the roof or basement you may not want it. You may need more than 2 feet of the fiberglass to reach the recommended R-49 for the roof in most areas. Two feet however hardly makes sense for space reasons and for what it would cost you, it'd be better to get foam insulation.

Window Shopping: Clear View of Big Energy Savings

Getting your heating and cooling costs down by 25% or more by choosing the right windows should be as easy as insulation is difficult. Window information has become, well, transparent in recent years. Detailed performance labels are affixed to them and understanding the numbers on them provides you with a lot of what you need to know to make the right choice.

To that end, fiberglass-framed windows from Alpen are widely seen as the most energy efficient. Fibertec, Thermo-tech (Canada) and several other companies cluster behind Alpen in producing highly energy efficient fiberglass windows. All these windows are also among the most expensive.

Performance and cost are driven by many factors. As always, the better deal financially goes to new house shoppers rather than homeowners installing replacement windows. The clear advantage is price. Since you're already paying for windows, you may be able to customize your new home by paying the builder the extra cost for the upgrade to the more energy efficient windows. You don't have that option with replacing old windows. You're starting from scratch and you're paying retail.

Replacement windows are likely to have at least one advantage. You will probably be getting a greater improvement in energy efficiency since windows being replaced in the existing home are probably much less energy efficient than those that would come standard in the new house. You may also enjoy quiet you never experienced before.

Even if you can't shake the cost of replacement window at least you'll be getting some money back in energy savings, as well as the same tangible benefits of quiet and air tightness as with windows in a new house. The alternatives for your home improvement money like new wood cabinets, marble countertop and chandelier may be pretty, but you don't get any money back from them.

Still, money talks, so here's new and existing house financial scenarios with these assumptions:

• Same number of windows and type, though north, south, east and west call for different glasses - at different prices.
• Average-sized windows retail from $200 to $1,000. The owner of an existing home gets good volume price at top: $900 each, while the owner of a new house pays the difference between code window and top window at builder's prices: $400 each.
• For red apple to green apple financing comparison the new home buyer adds to his mortgage to pay for the windows, while the existing home owner takes out a home equity loan.
• The existing home owner saves more on his heating and cooling bills than the new home owner does (i.e. see above).
• These assumptions do NOT take into consideration any of the tax credits, reduced interest rates or government rebates you may receive for making energy efficiency improvements that could lower your initial costs.

	New House	Existing House
Number of windows	12	12
Cost of each window	$400	$900
Total cost (i.e. borrow)	$4,800	$10,800
Monthly payments	$28 (30-yr. @ 5.8%)	$87 (15-yr. @ 7.7%)
Energy savings/Mo.	$25	$33
Net monthly cost	$3	$54

BOTTOM LINE: It might not cost a new home buyer anything to maximize their window energy efficiency and for existing home owner, while it will take many years to cover the expense, it will be one of your smaller financial burdens.

The Best of The Best

You need to consider two broad topics when buying a window: The glass and the frame. You can select from a half a dozen or more framing materials, though fiberglass stands out as a clear winner. That's followed by a look (pun intended) at the glass, which if you understand your needs (i.e. explained later) is easy to choose so long as you get the best price.

(Curtains, blinds, shades and awnings are part of the window insulation picture and, while it's not discussed here now, it's worth your attention at some point).

Frame materials:

• Fiberglass is the one. It has the best insulation. However, it's only best when it been given a booster shot of insulation and you have to check that the windows you're getting have been given it. Fiberglass is also durable, paint-able and made from, as we've said before, an abundant natural resource. Cheap, it's not. Nor can you find these frames easily.

Other framing materials:

• Wood excels for its look and naturalness, but should be FSC (Forest Stewardship Council) wood. It also has good insulation properties, not too far behind fiberglass. However, it has two major negatives. It's the most expensive material and the most difficult to maintain.
• Composite wood could be called wood with pluses and minuses. Its more durable than wood, but it's not as attractive and it's less eco-friendly (i.e. made from recycled wood and vinyl, a hazardous substance.).
• Vinyl is the cheapest and that's why it's the most popular. It provides decent insulation and is quite sturdy, but it can't be painted and, remember, it contains hazardous substances.
• Aluminum pulls up the insulation rear. Nuff said.

You make your choice on what kind of glass gives you the best insulation based on where your home is located, as in which of the 6 regions in the map above, and in which direction a window is facing. Glass today is practically an appliance and there are 3 parts to it that factor into getting the insulation you need:

• The more panes you have - with space in between them - the more insulation you've got, but 3's the max. Obviously, more panes make a window heavier. Alpen comes out on top for windows because it's the most efficient without being the heaviest. This is because it effectively has 4 panes, but with the weight of two. It does this by instead of having a middle pane it has 2 clear thin film sheets that create a third space between the 2 glass panes.
• Gas sealed between 2 or 3 panes, makes a big difference in how much insulation a window provides. You have 2 choices, besides air: Argon and Krypton, both inert gases. Krypton is preferable since it's twice as heavy as Argon and therefore provides more resistance to heat movement, but it's likely to add more to the cost of the window than Argon will because Krypton is harder to make.
• Spectrally selective Low-E coatings also helps improve a window's insulation value. Spectrally selective refers to the choices you may have in the amount of solar heat you want to allow into your home through the window. You can chose between high, moderate and low solar gain coatings and each fits in with a different climate. High for cold climates where you want to let the sun's heat in during the winter; low for hot climates and moderate for moderate climates.

All this leads us back to the window label, which should include at least the first 2 indicators and hopefully all 5:

• The U-Factor (U) is a number between 0 and 1 and is the reciprocal of the R-value. The lower it is the better the insulation of the window.
• The solar heat gain coefficient (SHGC) is also a number between 0 and 1. The closer to one it is the more solar heat it lets in and the closer to zero the less it allows in.
• The visible transmittance (VT) is another 0-1 number and is the amount of light that gets through a window. Best is high, but it's tricky because the frame counts and if you have a broad frame it's going to lower the score no matter how clear the glass.
• Air leakage (AL) is another 0-1 number and the lower the number the less the air leakage.
• Condensation resistance (CR) number - between 1-100 - tells how well the window resists condensation, which produces cold spots. The higher the number the better.

(Add one last energy efficency factor: window operation. A window that doesn't open provides the best insulation, followed by a casement, single-hung and double hung window, the vertical sliders that have been the staple of American homes for over 150 years).

Bringing it all together, the most energy efficient windows will have the labels with the best numbers. For example, Alpen has a U-factor of .1 in its fiberglass windows. It's 2 glass panes and 2 inner film sheets contain three spaces filled with Krypton gas. Fibertec, Thermo-tech (Canada) and a few others have U-factors twice as high. Their fiberglass frames contain 3 panes of low-e coated glass with 2 spaces filled with Argon gas. By comparison, a typical window today - vinyl-framed with 2 air-filled low-e coated panes - have U-factors above .4 and you can find literally thousands to choose from at the National Fenestration site.

Face South

Construction of a new home calls for observing a few simple points to get the most out of the sun's warmth in the winter and keeping it out in the summer:

• A new home should be built facing south. That is, the direction where a home's longest side with the most windows opening on to the rooms that get the most use faces.
• The roof should have an overhang extending far enough out so that it blocks the daytime summer sun, but not so far out as to block the lower-rising daytime winter sun.
• Consider installing heat-absorbing tiles on the floor of the southern facing rooms.
• Eastern and western walls should have few windows in moderate and warmer climes.
• Alternatively, plant trees in front of the western windows so the leaves keep out the summer sun, while in winter, without leaves, allow the sun in.
• Planting shrubs along the outside wall helps insulate the house at ground level.

Do all these things and you may knock 20% off your heating bill.

*

Passive Extra

Wood's Seal of Approval - Economically and Ecologically:

Look for the The Forest Stewardship Council label below on all wood packaging and invoices. It means the wood has come from a sustainable forest. You can use a page on the FSC's web site to help find dealers in FSC building lumber (or other wood products).

Just type in "lumber" next to products and click "search". You should be able to buy FSC dimensional lumber, the soft woods used in building homes, without having to pay more for it. Bonus with your purchase: Think of it as getting carbon credits for free.