Spray-In-Place Cellulose Insulation
Here are some more photos showing the spray-in-place cellulose wall insulation that’s being installed in the Energy Star home we’re building for a client. Installing cellulose spray-in-place insulation is a very effective way of insulating a home and almost completely stopping air infiltration.
As you can see in these photos the wall cavities between studs are completely packed tight with cellulose insulation. If you look closely you can see electrical outlet boxes that are covered with blue painters tape. The insulation is completely packed around each box to prevent any cold drafty spots.
The insulation crew finished up the house today. The house is 2350 sq ft on the main level, 800 sq ft for the garage and another 2350 sq ft in the basement. It took two crews only two days to air seal all the framing members and install the spray-in-place cellulose insulation.
It took the crew another day and a half to install the cellulose attic insulation. So in less than a week this house has been completely insulated including the garage and basement.
Overall spray-in-place cellulose insulation costs about 20% to 30% more than traditional fiberglass batt insulation. However, I’ve seen first hand how well the cellulose insulation performs especially when it comes to air infiltration and a blower door test. So it’s very likely that spray-in-place cellulose insulation will pay for itself in less than five years.
For this particular house it’s an important component of the Energy Star certification. I think it would be very difficult to meet the Energy Star guidelines by using traditional fiberglass insulation due to the poor air infiltration properties.
I just built a new home myself two years ago and I used fiberglass. If I had known about this product I certainly would have used it. But the real proof is in the performance. We’ve built four homes now with cellulose insulation and each of the owners are reporting significantly lower heating/cooling operating costs compared to similar homes built with fiberglass.
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Is it possible to use the wet cellulose in existing walls by cutting a hole and blowing the insulation into the hole like traditional blown cellulose or must the walls be fully open?
@ Ian – Actually I was just talking to the superintendent for the insulation company yesterday about this. You can in fact inject wet cellulose into the cavity with fiberglass. The fiberglass get’s compressed so that there is room for the cellulose. Not sure how well it works but they say they’ve done it.
[...] I’d be sure to have a full 18″ of cellulose in the attic and I’d opt for spray-in-place cellulose in the walls. Having said that our home is very comfortable and certainly not very expensive to [...]
[...] I’ve written several posts about how to insulate basements, How To Insulate Basement Walls and Basement Insulation. One of the best ways I know how to insulate a basement is using a combination of polystyrene foam board insulation and spray-in-place cellulose insulation. [...]
[...] the air sealing was finished this Energy Star home was insulated with spray-in-place cellulose insulation. Tags: Home Improvement, Home Improvement Blog, Home Improvement Advice, Energy Star [...]
[...] Spray-In-Place Cellulose Insulation [...]
[...] I’ve written several posts about how to insulate basements, How To Insulate Basement Walls and Basement Insulation. One of the best ways I know how to insulate a basement is using a combination of polystyrene foam board insulation and spray-in-place cellulose insulation. [...]
[...] barrier. Either use faced insulation in the wall cavity or install a vapor barrier (if you use Spray-In-Place Cellulose Insulation you may omit the vapor [...]
I have a house project with a concrete floor and a 2′ crawl space above it. steel frame and wood sub floor. can this product be sprayed in this situation? also can I diy or would a contractor have to apply this? its about 700 sq’. thank
@ Matt – Not exactly sure what your situation looks like….are you wanting to do the walls or floor? It’s not much of a DIY product.