FEB 02

The most effective building insulation materials currently in widespread use are polystyrene and polyisocyanurate panels and polyurethane spray foam. These materials have an R-value of about R-5 to R-6 per inch.

Fiberglass batts, which are widely used in residential construction, have an R-value of about R-3 per inch. Aerogel is an intriguing material which has an R-value of R-10 per inch, but it is still very expensive to produce and, because it is so fragile, it is difficult to incorporate into building materials. As these R-Values increase, so does the efficiency of heating and cooling, the largest slice of the home power-use pie.

Specialty panels with significantly higher performance are available. Vacuum boards can provide as much as R-30 per inch. And a company called Glacier Bay offers Barrier Ultra-R panels, which use aerogel inside a sealed, evacuated panel. Ultra R panels offer R-50 per inch insulation value, roughly 10X better than a conventional polystyrene or polyiso insulation board.

By incorporating the aerogel core inside the vacuum panel, the panels require a less extreme vacuum to obtain their insulation performance. And the reduced pressure differential due to the lower vacuum level translates into a longer life for the panel. A typical panel needs to have internal braces to keep the panel from being crushed by the outside atmospheric pressure (and these braces reduce the effectiveness of the vacuum insulation by acting as a thermal bridge that lets heat move from one side to the other). Aerogel is a very strong material, and supports the panel faces to prevent them from being crushed.

Even if the panel is punctured and the vacuum is lost, these panels will continue to perform at R-9 per inch, still nearly double a conventional insulation board. And the panels carry a 25 year warranty.

Glacier Bay markets these boards primarily for use in boat refrigerators, where efficiency is key, but they could be used in other insulation applications, albeit at an extraordinary price. Unfortunately, this is not a material that could be readily adapted to building construction without some serious modifications to building methods. Construction sites and traditional building methods do not typically deal well with fragile materials such as this.

At present, for building construction, aerogel is most commonly found in high performance translucent windows. However, with a process that could drastically lower the cost of producing aerogel, these panels could be the prototype for insulation panels that could transform how buildings are built.

Retrofitting older homes (or any buildings, really) to higher levels of insulation is hard because there isn't much space available. Currently, superinsulated buildings are sometimes built, but they tend to have thick walls. Affordable vacuum/aerogel insulation panels might lead to superinsulated building performance with walls that are only a couple of inches thick. Even retrofits might be feasible with a panel only an inch thick that would more than double a building's wall insulation.

link: Glacier Bay vacuum panel info

via Greenbuilding list - Thanks for the tip, Lawrence Lile

Comments (20)

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written by Ben, February 02, 2009

Sounds pretty good, hopefully prices will become realistic or governments start funding the correct things. Wonder how windows compare to other insulating methods

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written by greener guy, February 03, 2009

It is great to see advances in insulation. I'm in the middle of building a home and renovating a rental, to find something currently on the market that gives high R-values per inch would be good. Even hitting R15 /inch to renovate 2x4 walls would be nice to find locally.

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Aerogel?
written by Anthony, February 03, 2009

Wont aerogel kill you if you inhale it? I thought I remember hearing that a while back...

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Those things cost a fortune
written by Scott, February 03, 2009

In any new buildings you would have to be crazy to choose it. Much cheaper to get the same R-value with thicker layers of Styrofoam.

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written by Wranger, February 03, 2009

Sounds pretty good, hopefully prices will become realistic or governments start funding the correct things. Wonder how windows compare to other insulating methods

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written by thekanester, February 03, 2009

Aerogel can be made from a variety of materials. Silica aerogel will be as toxic as any glass fibre system, I expect, but who knows about the other varieties. Check this out:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aerogel#Safety

Any form of loft insulation is best avoided in terms of touching and inhalation.

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Sometimes you have to act irrationally
written by Robin Green, February 03, 2009

It may be that you can't cost-justify installing such high-priced but high-performing insulation in a construction project, given the assumed payback period compared to that of above-average but not outstanding insulation such as the R-6 or R-7.2 per inch of some of the urethane foams.

However, people routinely miscalculate payback by being conservative with both the potential energy savings and the future price of energy. I have seen this myself - I installed a high-efficiency furnace eleven years ago (94% efficient) when the economically sensible thing to do would have been to install a mid-efficiency furnace (80% efficient). The extra cost just couldn't be justified on the basis of future savings. But then natural gas prices started to go way up and suddenly the payback period got much shorter - so much so that I'm now reaping the benefits of the more efficient investment.

But looking over the price of this product and the fact that you have to order each sheet using an actual paper template, and pay $350 for a single sheet, it's pretty clear this isn't going to get used in too many places. It might make sense to make refrigerators out of it but no one is going to pull out Pink Panther insulation and order four sheets of this per stud to get R-240!

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new ideas for vacuum insulators?
written by Ron, February 03, 2009

Is it possible to build a wall out of some material that is both cheap and strong enough to maintain a significant vacuum? If the vacuum level that offers high R-value was in the wall cavity during the cold winter nights (and occasional days) then this idea might have merit.

Could you build a house with reinforced concrete walls on four sides and coat/treat those walls so the walls were not air-permeable? If so and those walls had an interior cavity that could be convienently evacuated then possibly you could produce an effective vacuum inside that wall cavity. If you could produce a useful vacuum inside the walls, then you could evacuate the wall cavities when the temperature was low enough to demand it.

Is this economically feasible with today’s technology?

Has this been tried before?

What kind of vacuum is necessary inside the cavity (in millibars) to produce an R-20 per inch or R-30 per inch insulating wall?

I don’t think I’ve seen a Table or Graph showing the R-Value per inch of partial vacuum cavities (eg. from say 1 atmosphere down to a .01 millibar vacuum). I would be very interested to view that Table/Graph if you have seen one.

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R- Value is not a magic wand
written by Artain, February 04, 2009

I'm really disappointed. This article waves one characteristic about this material around like it's a magic wand and expects its audience to be completely awed.

I'm disappointed that an article like this doesn't include a discussion on the embodied energy in the material nor does it include if it is recyclable. This article doesn't explain if this insulation is going to release noxious fumes during a fire, or if it's going to erupt in flames if it's punctured. The article doesn't explain what's needed to make this technology cheaper either.

Artain out,

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Not suitable for renovating old building
written by Patrick, February 05, 2009

The artcile talks about insulating old buildings with these modern materials. Unfortunately this would be a bad idea for various reasons:

1. This kind of insulation is most useful if applied to the OUTSIDE of the wall, with a gap of freely circulating air and a protection by siding (eg. boards). For old houses the outside is very important though and cannot be modified thus in most cases.

2. If the board was applied inside then the difficulty would be to fit them in, as old houses are not exactly measured, ie. length and angles are different for every single wall.

3. Styro boards, foam, vaccum panels etc, do not absorb moisture, so that there is a danger of mould developing inside, and this could affect the health of people living there. Condensation moisture could also damage the building structure -beams may rot, mud walls break down.

In conclusion it for old buildings it makes more sense to use natural insulation(hemp, wool, wood, reed), cellulose (wet) in combination with a moisture regulating airtight membrane. Wet cellulose would be most efficient in filling out all irregular gaps as can be fond in those building walls.

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re: R- Value is not a magic wand
written by Steve Bergman, February 12, 2009

Artain, why not do some research and write your own article rather than just moaning about your dissatisfaction with this one?

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re: r-value and not suitable
written by Scott McClellan, February 25, 2009

What I took away from this article is that there is a highly effective insulation matterial that is tough to incorporate into existing building and design methods. Instead of talking about whats wrong with it, why not try to figure out what situations it is right for.

For instance:

-This material would be suitable for specific applications in a structure where there is a major heating or cooling source that would save tons of energy through the highest possible insulation like a closet for a water heater or on even a server room that operates on its own hvac system.

Also, anyone who has ever opened up a wall in a coastal building knows that fiberglass insulation is a breeding ground for mold BECAUSE it absorbs moisture. Tackling the issue of mold means resolving the main cause of it: moisture. The only way to avoid mold is to reduce humidity not collect it.

In conclusion, we live in a time when we need to focus on what CAN be done with new environmental technologies, and where they CAN be useful, not where they can't.

Scotty out! (who says that? Atain, you're a tool)

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hmm..
written by Mark, March 02, 2009

we live in a time when we need to focus on what CAN be done with new environmental technologies, and where they CAN be useful, not where they can't.

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written by Hussey, March 30, 2009

we live in a time when we need to focus on what CAN be done with new environmental technologies, and where they CAN be useful, not where they can't.

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written by Dinda, May 28, 2009

I wish to use ultra r panels for new home which is under construction so how much would it cost me???

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written by karl-petrus, June 08, 2009

so how is it? is aerogel strong or fragile?

and what is a less extreme vacuum?

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Inventor Insulation Business Consultants
written by William Daviau, July 03, 2009

A vacuum aerogel panel is being used by Sigma Electric Manufacturing in their new Insulated Electrical Box. The electrical box is that thing that holds receptacles, switches, and light fixtures. There are about 61 such boxes in the average home and together, they leak about $200.00 in heating and cooling energy annually as they are currently configured.
The cost of aerogel is about to come way down with the invention of Maerogel, a product from Malaysia.

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written by Satish, July 29, 2009

we live in a time when we need to focus on what CAN be done with new environmental technologies, and where they CAN be useful, not where they can't.

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written by wedding dresses, October 13, 2009

The most effective building insulation materials currently in widespread use are polystyrene and polyisocyanurate panels and polyurethane spray foam. These materials have an R-value of about R-5 to R-6 per inch.

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very cool stuff, but
written by mike, January 24, 2010

It would still be cheaper to construct a new home with double stud walls, a darn good vapor barrier, and twenty-four inches of fiberglass insulation all around, top and bottom. Add insulated window shutters, insulated doors, and the need for a furnace would be non-existent. An air-to- air heat exchanger would be needed for air changes, and a tiny, perhaps 3500btu variable speed air-conditioning system would be required to dehumidify and slightly cool the air. A few rooftop solar panels and a few storage batteries would supply the energy for heating and cooling the structure. All this is available now, for a lot less than fanciful (but very interesting) products.

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