Protect Your Green Investments with Proper Insulation
Home Insulation Overview
Insulation is critical to ensuring that your home is energy efficient. Insulation reduces unwanted heat loss or gain and can decrease the energy demands of heating and cooling systems. In addition, a good insulating system includes a combination of advanced products and construction techniques that protect a home from outside heat or cold, prevent air leaks, and control moisture. Without proper insulation, all of the energy efficient tips for your home heating and cooling are ineffective.
As a homeowner, proper home insulation can help you lower your utility bills by reducing unwanted loss or gain of heat, increase the comfort of your home due to uniform temperature throughout your home, and help minimizing condensation in your home thus preventing decay or deterioration.
Who Should Upgrade Their Home Insulation?
Almost every home needs insulation, but you might want to consider replacing or adding new insulation if you fall into the following categories:*
1. Your home is older and you have not added insulation. In fact, only 20% of homes built before 1980 are well insulated.
2. Your home is either really cold in the winter or very hot in the summer. By adding proper insulation, you can even out these temperature extremes and create a more uniform living environment.
3. You are either building a new home or are adding a new roof or addition.
4. If your energy bills are extremely high, your insulation is most likely not doing its job and needs to be replaced.
5. Your home is loud due to outside noise…proper insulation can shield your home from unwanted outside noise.
Tips to Maximize the Effectiveness of your Existing Home Insulaton
In addition to upgrading or adding more insulation to your home, you should try the following tips to help maximize the effectiveness of what you already have:*
1. Seal heating ducts and insulate ducts that run through unheated spaces like attics and basements;
2. Check the filters on your furnace regularly and clean them at least once a month to ensure the blowers don’t have to work as hard to move air;
3. Don't block registers, baseboards, radiators or cold air returns as air must circulate through and around them for maximum efficiency;
4. Place heat-resistant radiator reflectors between exterior walls and the radiators to direct the heat inward towards the room;
5. In cold climates, install insulating draperies on all windows to use to keep the heat in at night;
6. In cold climates, during the day keep the draperies and shades on your south-facing windows open to allow the sunlight to enter and warm your home and then close them at night to trap heat and prevent any cooling you may feel from cold windows; and
7. In warm climates, keep the window coverings closed during the day to prevent solar gain (heating from sun’s rays).
*source: www.energystar.gov & www.energy.gov
