Innovation Anthology #175: Director, Marketing and Communications
When upgrading the insulation in the 2×4 construction of an older home, you might go from R12 to R20.
But what if you could achieve R56 or R100?
Those are the insulation values you’ll find at the Riverdale Net Zero House in Edmonton.
The main objective of energy conservation is to keep heat from escaping to the outside.
So just like you might cover yourself with a thick blanket to keep warm, the Riverdale house sports very thick walls.
But as engineer Gordon Howell explains, they too are made from the lowly 2X4.
GORDON HOWELL: The walls are somewhere around 400 millimeters (or 16 inches) thick. It’s a double stud 2×4 wall. So there’s an inner stud and an outer stud with a big space inbetween and its all filled with a cellulose fibre insulation which is made of chopped up newspapers. It is R59 worth of insulation but then when you consider the thermal bridging in the wall, the effective R value of the wall is R56.
The ceiling cavity of the Riverdale NetZero house is insulated with 685 millimeters or 27 inches of blown cellufibre insulation, giving an insulation factor of R100. Now that’s toasty.
Learn more at InnovationAnthology.com
I’M CHERYL CROUCHER
Guest
Tara Barnas,
Innovate Calgary, Edmonton, Alberta, Calgary,
Sponsor
Program Date: 2008-10-14