Your home is FREEZING! And here's why. Time to upgrade your insulation.

If you are wondering why your house takes such a long time to warm up, and shortly thereafter, it gets really cold again, making your heating equipment run more frequently and longer than your friends’, it may be a sign that the insulation in your building envelope (the components that make up the sealed outer shell of your house construction) is not up to par with today’s material standards or building codes, and in need of an upgrade.

The Ontario Building Code’s supplementary standard SB-12 had been implemented in 2010, prescribing specific levels of insulation within the different areas of the building envelope, as well as more stringent construction methods,

Benefits and risks of an air tight home

in order to achieve a more balanced building air leakage rate, retain as much heat as possible, have the air handler operate less frequently, and save the homeowner some money at the same time.

With the passing of the years since it's implementation, the supplementary standards’ acceptable values for the insulation levels of a home had increased. Currently, the minimum levels of insulation for the construction of a new house are as follows:

(Note that the R value of a material represents it's level of resistance to conductive heat flow)

Ceiling with attic space – R60

Ceiling without attic space (flat roofs) – R31

Exposed floors (Floors with exposed soil or no basement underneath) – R31

Walls above grade – R22

Basement walls – R20 ci (Continuous insulation – spray foam or rigid foam - about 4")

Slab less than 2 feet below grade – R10

In large developed, metropolitan core areas, where houses are usually older and more outdated, the construction methods used were quite loose with regards to their building envelope. More specifically, their air and vapour barriers were not sealed properly, and their insulation levels were low and frequently installed inadequately. That is the main reason a lot of these homes get large amounts of condensation and heat loss, through faulty ceiling, wall, and floor construction. What commonly ends up happening is the oversizing of furnaces and heating appliances, to keep up with the increased demand of the “loose” house. This leads to unnecessarily high energy costs and a possibility of overtasking the heating equipment which could lead to untimely failure.

With today’s inflated energy prices, it is a frequent recommendation to upgrade the insulation of a house when an HVAC upgrade takes place. Most home owners upgrade their heating equipment to high efficiency standards, however, in most cases, the walls, ceilings, and floors are kept poorly insulated, creating the abovementioned issues. It is well understood that the labour and material costs associated with such an extensive renovation can be overwhelming, however, there are a lot of incentive programs offered both provincially and federally (Click the button below the paragraph to see the rebates), and these could potentially reduce a significant portion of the construction costs, not to mention the long-term energy cost savings, and an elevated resale value.

Canada upgrade rebates

A strong final argument for upgrading the insulation in an older home is the costs associated with a ducted heating

system. Even a slight upgrade to the insulation system can significantly reduce the heat loss throughout the home, allowing for the reduction in size of the heating equipment and associated ductwork. Less ductwork means less fabrication and installation costs.