Never a better time to insulate your home
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| Home insulation has become a top priority; 1/3 of the UK’s carbon emissions come from the energy needed to heat buildings. Experts believe that for every £3.00 spent on household energy bills, £1.00 is down to waste. Victorian, Edwardian and Georgian homes are the worst for this. On cold nights, uninsulated walls and lofts are better at warming the air outside than inside, at the expense of the environment and our wallets.
But don’t be alarmed, it might not be as expensive as you think to insulate your home, with the government’s ‘Home Energy Saving Programme’. With this, energy companies offer grants to homeowners undertaking these improvements - visit www.energysavingtrust.org.uk for more details.
If the government incentive hasn’t convinced you, then maybe a company called ‘Heatseekers’ will. They have been working in partnership with 25 local authorities across Britain since October 2008; their aim is to confront homeowners with visual evidence of wasted energy.
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They survey up to 1000 homes per hour in the winter months, driving down streets at 10mph taking multi-coloured, heat sensitive images. They pinpoint the homes that need attention and call in for a consultation to provide quotes and information on government funded schemes.
The 3 main ways to insulate your home depending on the walls you’re dealing with are:
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Cavity wall insulation: Insulating a 3 bed semi-detached house takes approximately 3 hours costing roughly £500 but will save up to £120 a year on your energy bill.
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External insulation: If your home has solid external walls, then a layer of insulation 5-10cm thick can be added to the exterior of your building. Costing approximately £4,500 to insulate a 3 bed semi, with an average saving of £380 per annum.
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Internal insulation: If your home has solid external walls, then 3-5cm thick insulated plasterboard can be added to the interior of external walls. Costing approximately £42 per square metre, with an average annual saving of £360.
Visit www.nationalinsulationassociation.org.uk for a free survey and quote to avoid any hidden costs, particularly with solid-wall insulation as this can be quite expensive, with a lot of disruption too, so it maybe best to tackle it as part of a renovation project.
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