Types of Home Insulation Materials

Insulation for the house makes it a more comfortable place to live in. By getting rid of the cold draughts and ensuring that the rooms stay warm, your comfort and happiness at home will rise. Another thing that will help by insulating your home is that you will reduce the costs that you spend on heating your home. Energy in Europe but also in other parts of the world has become more expensive. If you want to help reduce the world wide climate problem, you will do your part in this by installing insulation in your home. The less energy your home needs, the better for the planet. Every corner of the house needs help such as the windows, doors, the walls, roofs and don’t forget about the floors. Let’s dive deeper into this subject and give some examples about how to perform this.

There are many different types of insulation for your house. The insulation you need is depending on where or what you would like to insulate. Let’s give some examples of types of insulation materials and where these can be used at home.

Spray foam insulation materials

Spray foam insulation is a product that is made from chemical products, isocyanate and polyol resin, these will react when they are being mixed together and will expand after it is sprayed on a surface. This functional aspect makes the foam very handy to use in areas that are hard to reach or where other insulation materials won’t fit properly. The foam provides thermal insulation and minimizes air filtration and thereby is often used in building construction.

Blanket insulation

This type of insulation can be found either in batts or rolls and is one of the most used types of insulation. It is made up of small fibers which mostly are fiberglass but can also be made from mineral wool such as rock and slag or natural fibers. The roll insulation comes with and without facing and the continuous rolls can be cut and trimmed to make it fit for the space you would like to fill. Batt insulation like rockwool slabs (Dutch: steenwol platen) can be found in multiple sorts of widths and panels that can be pre-cut and directly fit for the job.

These kinds of insulation materials are most of the time being installed in unfinished walls such as foundation walls but also floors and ceilings. It can be placed between joists or studs and beams that are mounted free from obstructions like pipes, wiring, ducts etc. A blanket insulation material can also be used for acoustical insulation, or as thermal insulation inside your house.

Insulation boards

When you have got the desire to insulate a flat roof, basements, overlay roofs, sarking roofs, facades, floors or a cavity wall insulation boards are the type of insulation to select. It is important to pick the correct materials if you prefer to insulate with boards. 

• PIR boards 

Have a wide applicability and are ideal to insulate a flat roof or a cavity wall. The boards are thin, consist of a very high fire safety value and have got excellent thermal properties. PIR insulation can be used for the insulation of roofs such as when you want a flat roof insulation(Dutch: plat dak isoleren) that consists of EPDM or a PVC roofing.

• PUR

PUR is one of the more efficient materials that are for sale on the market. It can be found in foam or in the shape of boards.

• XPS

XPS insulation is mainly being used to insulate basements, overlay roofs, sarking roofs, facades or cavity walls. The panels are pressure-resistant and are therefore very useful for floor insulation.

Blown-in insulation

This type of insulation can be used in cavity walls or loft floors without a hassle. It can easily seal small gaps and spaces as it settles. It fills every spot where cold air can come in. The other advantage of this material is that it helps reduce sound transfer between the outdoors and the indoors.