Added insulation and Attic Spray Foam

User: jdnail78@gmail.com

Vendor: Drive Green - Green Energy Consumers Alliance

Action: 2361 - Insulate and Air Seal Your Home

In 2014, I had insulation added in the ceiling of my garage (which is right under my master bedroom), a crawlspace, and a wall between an unheated entry and a bedroom. In 2015, I installed spray foam in my attic. The spray foam made the most noticeable difference: my oil usage dropped 30%, the house was less drafty, and to my surprise my electric bill dropped 20% in the winter because the circulator pumps for my baseboard hot water didn't need to run as much. Spray foam is expensive and if I had it to do over, I might take one contractor's recommendation for what is called "flash-and-batt". Instead of spraying foam in multiple layers to fill the entire rafter depth, you spray one layer (~2 inches) then put batts of fiberglass or mineral wool on top of that. You still get both the air sealing benefit of the spray foam and good insulation (though not as high as all spray foam) but the flash-and-batt would have been half the cost. Also, be careful of what spray foam you use because some use a blowing agent that has a more potent global warming impact than CO2, some of them hundreds of times more impact which undoes the carbon reduction you get for many years. My contractor used a Lapolla foam which has only the same global warming potential as CO2.