Invest in Insulation

This morning I have submitted my home meter readings to my supplier via their online portal. Whilst on their website I noticed my account was £304 in credit. I also noticed the website gave me the option of requesting a lower standing order.

Currently I pay £76 per month (Gas & Electric). With a brave face, I chose to take the plunge and requested that my standing order be reduced by a whopping £20 a month. The website reminded that I may need this extra credit during the colder winter months and I was then asked to justify this request.

Can you believe that? I was asked to justify reducing the amount of my hard earned cash that they were holding!!!!

I responded by typing, “Insulation works undertaken” in the box. I will now patiently wait to see if my request will be accepted. What occurs to me is what a good investment insulation really is.

I recently undertook a loft insulation survey for a client. Following which, I was able to source the supply and install of loft insulation for £7 per m2. Having done the calculations, I was then able to demonstrate to the client that the loft insulation would save them £2 per m2 per year. The client was glad to see that the investment achieved payback in 3.5yrs.

Therefore, in this case my client saw a return on investment (ROI) of 29%. This ROI is huge and certainly needs shouting about. Even more so, given that had my client invested the same sum in savings or an ISA he would have been lucky to have seen anything above a 10% return.

I wonder if energy saving technologies were sold more as an investment with a stated ROI would we see more of an uptake? Maybe financial directors would approve more projects presented with a ROI, rather than being sold on payback alone.

Is this form of psychology worth pursuing?

Insulation products are such a good investment. It has long amazed me why we are so keen to overlook insulation and in doing so allow our “hard earned cash” to literally escape through our buildings.

With this in mind, it is hardly surprising that in 2010 it was reported that typical home insulation levels within the UK were of the same standard of 1970 homes in Sweden.

Now you may think I am being over the top and that surely everyone has had their loft insulated. Well I can assure you that is definitely not the case. In 2010, I began working for a local authority where I made the mistake of assuming that every loft space would have already been addressed.

Then I started auditing Council properties and I realised that I had a 50% success rate of finding uninsulated loft spaces. I even found some loft voids that only contained a ceiling tiles worth of insulation, if you can call that insulation.

A good friend of mine who happens to be financial adviser, often talks about how hard his money is working for him, and whether his money would work harder if he put it somewhere else. I wonder if he has looked at how well his home is insulated, as I think he would struggle to better an investment with an ROI of 29%.

So why is insulation so awesome?

People are often surprised at how annoyed I get when I find poor levels of insulation and likewise how happy I am to rectify such situations. So why do I think insulation is so awesome? Well, insulation will not only save you money and keep you warm in the winter. It will also save you money and keep you cool in the summer.

And it is for the latter reason that we really need to start becoming more conscious of. Recently, the energy journals have been full of stories regarding the boom in air conditioning sales following this year’s heat wave both at home and in Europe.

What frustrates me is that no one is talking about improving insulation levels. If we can improve our insulation levels, the required power demand for air conditioning could be significantly less.

A building that is cold in the winter and roasting in the summer is screaming at you that it is poorly insulated. If you both heat and cool that building, better insulation has the potential to double your energy savings. As we move into colder winters and warmer summers, the argument for greater insulation makes even more sense.

The message is clear. If you are thinking of investing in any form of cooing, I suggest you investigate your insulation levels first.

Simple but highly efficient