Wood has long been the material of choice for framing, walls, and floors, but designers often fall back on conventional foam insulation to keep the heat in and the elements out. New research from Forest Products Laboratory in the US introduces an insulation system that may help give forest products the green light to fill in new gaps.
Supervisory Materials Research Engineer Samuel Zelinka and Research Physical Scientist Samuel Glass has proposed a new type of insulation called Mirrorpanel.
Mirrorpanel takes advantage of the low thermal conductivity of still air, and is made of closely spaced layers of coated paper in a wood or fiberboard frame. In testing it has performed as well as its foam counterpart and would even meet the stringent 2012 International Energy Conservation Code (IECC) for continuous insulation.
While paper-based insulation is not a new development in the forest products industry, it is the layered construction, IECC compliance and thermal efficiency, and scalability of the panels which puts Mirrorpanel ahead of the pack.
Click here for source (Lab Notes, Forest Products Laboratory)
Photo: Lab Notes, Forest Products Laboratory
