7 ms·

> better insulation better insulation is not cheap and therefore not everyone can afford to do it. Also the same people who want renewables are usually opposed

> better insulation better insulation is not cheap and therefore not everyone can afford to do it. Also the same people who want renewables are usually opposed to building new housing so there's that.

taneq 4y ago
It's not super expensive, really. And this is something that building codes can address - either via the gentle option of requiring all newly built dwellings to be thermally efficient, or the somewhat more assertive route of requiring any home sold to have adequate insulation.
brtkdotse 4y ago
The actual insulation is stupid cheap when you look at the ROI. However, installing in on an existing house is really tricky and you can cause a lot of moisture related damage if you do it in the wrong way.
- Roritharr 4y ago
  The house I live in, like everyone's in my street, is from the late 1800s. Insulating those houses from the outside is very expensive, to the tune of 200k, where the house is worth around 500k in the inflated environment we're in. At the very same time, I haven't found a single insurance company willing to insure the house after insulation for insulation related moisture damage. This makes insulating this house an absurdly bad financial decision, since once you have moisture damage in any part of this material, you can basically demolish most of the walls since it soaks like a sponge. Mind you, I have not started going into the pitfalls of the legality of even touching a house this old in Germany, where you have to deal with "Denkmalschutz". Insulating new construction and retrofitting insulation are two absolutely different things and barely have anything to do with each other from the cost-benefit ratio.
  - brtkdotse 4y ago
    Absolutely, and the thing about old houses is that they've evolved to keep moisture and ventilation in check without access to modern tech. Modern tech, as you point out, usually makes things worse. My house in Sweden is from the 1950's and I still had to be _very_ mindful when adding insulation. The best thing I've found is cellulose-based insulation, basically shredded newspapers lined with salts and pressed to sheets. The can buffer a lot of moisture without developing mold.
  - badpun 4y ago
    Interesting, why isn't the moisture on walls behind insulation ever an issue on new construction?
    - brtkdotse 4y ago
      Old constructions are diffusion open, meaning moisture can move freely in and out of it. New constructions are diffusion closed, meaning you have a steam barrier on the inside which blocks the moist indoors air from traveling into the walls. This however requires an airtight house and mechanical ventilation.
    - __alexs 4y ago
      Because they use a dual layer construction with an air gap between the inner an outer walls. This gives space for condensation to occur and evaporate again without effecting the living space. In old buildings with solid walls you can get condensation on the walls that will evaporate because the living space is heated and we'll ventilated. If you clad that wall in insulation you can prevent the evaporation which leads to damp problems.
    - sgerenser 4y ago
      In addition to what was already said, there definitely is and has been many moisture issues on walls and exteriors in new construction. A condo building near me had to have its exterior completely torn off, and lots of sheathing, insulation, cladding, etc replaced due to a botched install of EIFS. Google for “EIFS failures.” This was a big problem in the 80s/90s or so but apparently it’s still happening, at least with subpar builders.
    - throw0101a 4y ago
      > Interesting, why isn't the moisture on walls behind insulation ever an issue on new construction? Newer building codes have started to mandate more external insulation: * https://www.buildingscience.com/documents/insights/bsi-001-the-perfect-wall https://www.buildingscience.com/documents/insights/bsi-001-t... Depending on the climate zone, up to half the insulation may be mandated to be on the outside (behind some kind of cladding (brick, stucco, siding) to protect it from UV and bulk water). Per the above article, by having the outside be insulation, your interior structure is kept warmer, and so condensation is less likely to occur. Do a search for "Joseph Lstiburek" and "Matt Risinger", who have lots of articles and videos on building science. * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Building_science https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Building_science
  - cabby 4y ago
    Have you looked at hempcrete? I'm in France and have just started looking at better insulation for an old stone large property.
  - GekkePrutser 4y ago
    Same here in Spain. But in this climate I don't need insulation anyway.. My energy costs are 60 euro a month in winter and 30 in summer. No point even trying to insulate.
    - brtkdotse 4y ago
      Including heating/gas?
      - krageon 4y ago
        Is that not energy
      - GekkePrutser 4y ago
        Yes included. I don't have gas heating anyway. Just a little plug-in electric radiator.
midasuni 4y ago
In the U.K. the people who want renewables tend to be under 40s that can’t afford to buy a house. Those that actively don’t want renewables tend to own their own home and may have a couple the let out.
- robertlagrant 4y ago
  Pretty much no-one actively doesn't want renewables. They might not want them built very near them, but that's different.
  - Ekaros 4y ago
    I'm not against them, but I think they should not be specially subsidised. Just pay what ever the market rate at the moment is. If it is not enough to cover investment too bad.
    - smallerfish 4y ago
      Surely they should be at least as equally subsidized as other energy sources, with the cost of external cleanup perhaps also factored in?
    - LadyCailin 4y ago
      That would be fine with me, if every energy source had to pay its own negative externalities.
      - Ekaros 4y ago
        Will absolutely all of the externalities of mining, manufacturing and transport then be also applied to renewables? Also, maybe if there is any risk of damage to surroundings like with hydro batteries there would be need to deposit amount of money that covers them fully.
        oblio 4y ago
        Yes, they should. Otherwise we'll just drown in a hot sea of shit, only 50 years down the line. Everything needs to be sustainable, kind of by definition. But as with any problem, let's first start with the stuff causing the damage. Let's get oil and gas and coal to pay for EVERY negative externality.
Semaphor 4y ago
> Also the same people who want renewables are usually opposed to building new housing so there's that. What? Why would you think that?
- pydry 4y ago
  - robertlagrant 4y ago
    They want new housing but often built by the government instead of evil property developers.
    - jonnycomputer 4y ago
      And new housing, .. but not built in their neighborhoods. Oh, and don't build over farmland or undeveloped green spaces. Without being snarky, the problem here is that there is a tension between what people believe in general, and what they believe about their situations specifically, especially when they have an incentive to feel the opposite way about it. For example, people may know (or believe) that building duplexes and apartments in their neighborhoods will reduce their property values, or "ruin the character of the neighborhood" and so oppose them.
    - pydry 4y ago
      Private property developers simply dont want to build affordable housing. The margins are just lower than they are for luxury housing. Who would choose to make 4% profit when you could make 20? They do lobby hard to remove building regulations in the name of building more affordable housing but they never actually build it unless local government actively forces them to with some of those regulations they hate, at which point they build the bare minimum and install a poor door.
      - zbrozek 4y ago
        They're always going to build the highest margin product for which there is demand. You're not going to get cheap housing until there is abundance. It's simple supply and demand.

taneq 4y ago

It's not super expensive, really. And this is something that building codes can address - either via the gentle option of requiring all newly built dwellings to be thermally efficient, or the somewhat more assertive route of requiring any home sold to have adequate insulation.

brtkdotse 4y ago

The actual insulation is stupid cheap when you look at the ROI. However, installing in on an existing house is really tricky and you can cause a lot of moisture related damage if you do it in the wrong way.

Roritharr 4y ago
The house I live in, like everyone's in my street, is from the late 1800s. Insulating those houses from the outside is very expensive, to the tune of 200k, where the house is worth around 500k in the inflated environment we're in. At the very same time, I haven't found a single insurance company willing to insure the house after insulation for insulation related moisture damage. This makes insulating this house an absurdly bad financial decision, since once you have moisture damage in any part of this material, you can basically demolish most of the walls since it soaks like a sponge. Mind you, I have not started going into the pitfalls of the legality of even touching a house this old in Germany, where you have to deal with "Denkmalschutz". Insulating new construction and retrofitting insulation are two absolutely different things and barely have anything to do with each other from the cost-benefit ratio.
- brtkdotse 4y ago
  Absolutely, and the thing about old houses is that they've evolved to keep moisture and ventilation in check without access to modern tech. Modern tech, as you point out, usually makes things worse. My house in Sweden is from the 1950's and I still had to be _very_ mindful when adding insulation. The best thing I've found is cellulose-based insulation, basically shredded newspapers lined with salts and pressed to sheets. The can buffer a lot of moisture without developing mold.
- badpun 4y ago
  Interesting, why isn't the moisture on walls behind insulation ever an issue on new construction?
  - brtkdotse 4y ago
    Old constructions are diffusion open, meaning moisture can move freely in and out of it. New constructions are diffusion closed, meaning you have a steam barrier on the inside which blocks the moist indoors air from traveling into the walls. This however requires an airtight house and mechanical ventilation.
  - __alexs 4y ago
    Because they use a dual layer construction with an air gap between the inner an outer walls. This gives space for condensation to occur and evaporate again without effecting the living space. In old buildings with solid walls you can get condensation on the walls that will evaporate because the living space is heated and we'll ventilated. If you clad that wall in insulation you can prevent the evaporation which leads to damp problems.
  - sgerenser 4y ago
    In addition to what was already said, there definitely is and has been many moisture issues on walls and exteriors in new construction. A condo building near me had to have its exterior completely torn off, and lots of sheathing, insulation, cladding, etc replaced due to a botched install of EIFS. Google for “EIFS failures.” This was a big problem in the 80s/90s or so but apparently it’s still happening, at least with subpar builders.
  - throw0101a 4y ago
    > Interesting, why isn't the moisture on walls behind insulation ever an issue on new construction? Newer building codes have started to mandate more external insulation: * https://www.buildingscience.com/documents/insights/bsi-001-the-perfect-wall https://www.buildingscience.com/documents/insights/bsi-001-t... Depending on the climate zone, up to half the insulation may be mandated to be on the outside (behind some kind of cladding (brick, stucco, siding) to protect it from UV and bulk water). Per the above article, by having the outside be insulation, your interior structure is kept warmer, and so condensation is less likely to occur. Do a search for "Joseph Lstiburek" and "Matt Risinger", who have lots of articles and videos on building science. * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Building_science https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Building_science
- cabby 4y ago
  Have you looked at hempcrete? I'm in France and have just started looking at better insulation for an old stone large property.
- GekkePrutser 4y ago
  Same here in Spain. But in this climate I don't need insulation anyway.. My energy costs are 60 euro a month in winter and 30 in summer. No point even trying to insulate.
  - brtkdotse 4y ago
    Including heating/gas?
    - krageon 4y ago
      Is that not energy
    - GekkePrutser 4y ago
      Yes included. I don't have gas heating anyway. Just a little plug-in electric radiator.

midasuni 4y ago

In the U.K. the people who want renewables tend to be under 40s that can’t afford to buy a house. Those that actively don’t want renewables tend to own their own home and may have a couple the let out.

robertlagrant 4y ago
Pretty much no-one actively doesn't want renewables. They might not want them built very near them, but that's different.
- Ekaros 4y ago
  I'm not against them, but I think they should not be specially subsidised. Just pay what ever the market rate at the moment is. If it is not enough to cover investment too bad.
  - smallerfish 4y ago
    Surely they should be at least as equally subsidized as other energy sources, with the cost of external cleanup perhaps also factored in?
  - LadyCailin 4y ago
    That would be fine with me, if every energy source had to pay its own negative externalities.
    - Ekaros 4y ago
      Will absolutely all of the externalities of mining, manufacturing and transport then be also applied to renewables? Also, maybe if there is any risk of damage to surroundings like with hydro batteries there would be need to deposit amount of money that covers them fully.
      - oblio 4y ago
        Yes, they should. Otherwise we'll just drown in a hot sea of shit, only 50 years down the line. Everything needs to be sustainable, kind of by definition. But as with any problem, let's first start with the stuff causing the damage. Let's get oil and gas and coal to pay for EVERY negative externality.

Semaphor 4y ago

> Also the same people who want renewables are usually opposed to building new housing so there's that. What? Why would you think that?

pydry 4y ago
- robertlagrant 4y ago
  They want new housing but often built by the government instead of evil property developers.
  - jonnycomputer 4y ago
    And new housing, .. but not built in their neighborhoods. Oh, and don't build over farmland or undeveloped green spaces. Without being snarky, the problem here is that there is a tension between what people believe in general, and what they believe about their situations specifically, especially when they have an incentive to feel the opposite way about it. For example, people may know (or believe) that building duplexes and apartments in their neighborhoods will reduce their property values, or "ruin the character of the neighborhood" and so oppose them.
  - pydry 4y ago
    Private property developers simply dont want to build affordable housing. The margins are just lower than they are for luxury housing. Who would choose to make 4% profit when you could make 20? They do lobby hard to remove building regulations in the name of building more affordable housing but they never actually build it unless local government actively forces them to with some of those regulations they hate, at which point they build the bare minimum and install a poor door.
    - zbrozek 4y ago
      They're always going to build the highest margin product for which there is demand. You're not going to get cheap housing until there is abundance. It's simple supply and demand.