August 22,
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Bybradfordairandheating
In order to have a more comfortable home, home climate control must be implemented. This system control for home climate is commonly addressed as the HVAC (heating, ventilation and air condition) system. Phenolic foam insulations are commonly used for ducts, walls, and roofing. HVAC control, when properly implemented by a competent and licensed technician like Bradford Air & Heating can bring out many benefits, not only for the home climate control but in many other aspects as well.
Proper HVAC system implementation has many other benefits such as the prevention of excessive cooling and heating, energy cost reduction, preventing the owner&#;s contact to hot surfaces, providing sound insulation and thermal insulation, thus bringing comfort to the owner.
The ducts play a key role in the HVAC system, thus insulating the ducts must be taken into consideration with high regard. Common materials include mineral wools, cellulose, fiberglass, and foams. The phenolic foam is a common type of foam insulation.
Using phenolic foam insulation, while effective in bringing comfort to the homes, poses various risks to the owners of the house. These risks include steel or metallic-layer corrosion, deterioration, shrinkage and other environmental hazards. Phenolic foam insulation may be able to cause severe corrosion between contacts of the metallic layer and the steel roofing installation. The gaps between the two, if not eliminated completely, may be a moisture trap that can trigger rust formation, which will eat up both the metallic layer on the insulation. If the metallic layer or the aluminum facing of the insulation gets cut or punctured with, its exposure to moisture and high concentration chemicals speed up deterioration process of the foam setup.
Proper precautions must be followed in protecting the foam, and that includes checking for defacing on the foam&#;s surface. Shrinkage, most of the time, is evident in any kind of foam insulation. After curing or fitting of the phenolic foam into the duct, walls or pipes, a notable decrease in the size of the foam is observed to be at about 2% of the size of the foam actually applied. 2% is a significant amount to cause a gap or leak in the HVAC system. A re-application or refitting of new foams to the gaps may be required.
Environmental effects of using phenolic foam insulation may not be seen at a glance, however, after some time, the gas as the foaming agent may be released and exchanged with the air creating air pollution. Although it has been long since most suppliers stopped producing foams that use CFCs (chlorofluorocarbons) as foaming agent, there are still some who produce these kinds of foams. These chemicals, when released into the air, can be very harmful not only to human respiration but to the ozone layer too.
While HVAC focuses on controlling the internal climate in one&#;s home, it is still important to deal with the risk that comes with using different materials for the system, such as the phenolic foam in insulation. It is needless to say that comfort may not be achieved if risks of incurring damage to health and environment can&#;t be eliminated.
The post Home Climate Control- The Risks of Phenolic Foam Insulations appeared first on Bradford Air & Heating.
A particularly well thought-out and thorough question from longtime GBA reader Aaron Birkland on the pH of phenolic foam and its possible corrosive nature prompted me to follow up my original blog on Kingspan&#;s Kooltherm rigid insulation.
Aaron has two main questions:
Phenolic foam rigid insulation was introduced in the U.S. in the s and sold by Beazer East and Johns Manville, but serious corrosion problems resulted in legal action and both companies ceased production in .
Kingspan, an Irish company with a completely new formulation for its phenolic foam insulation, has been producing and selling Kooltherm in Europe since , introducing it in the U.S. in .
In , Dow Building Solutions introduced a white paper, &#;Rigid Polymeric Foam Boardstock Technical Assessment,&#; at a Society of Plastics Engineers conference. This paper compares certain performance properties of two types of phenolic foam, one type of polyisocyanurate, and one type of extruded polystyrene (XPS) insulation. Here are the most important points from this paper:
Dr. Jan Kosny of Fraunhofer Institute (see last section of blog) is a widely respected building scientist and materials expert; Kosny characterized this Dow report as &#;marketing material.&#;
Kingspan provided me with a third-party pH test of their Kooltherm insulation conducted by Cardiff University, dated July 21, , following the test method for EN: &#;Thermal insulating products for building equipment and industrial installations &#; Determination of trace quantities of water soluble chloride, fluoride, silicate, and sodium ions and pH.&#; Two samples of the insulation yielded pH test results of 6.51 and 6.49.
Kingspan shared a test report with me prepared by BDA Keuringsinstituut (a division of Kiwa NV, a Netherlands-based testing laboratory), dated January 22, . I do not have permission to copy or post this full report, but below is information from the report.
For the BDA Keuringsinstituut tests, four types of rigid insulation &#; mineral wool, Kingspan phenolic foam, polyurethane (PUR), and expanded polystyrene (EPS) &#; were fastened with washers and screws to a profiled steel deck (see Image #1, above) and the insulation then covered with an EPDM roof membrane (see Image #2, below). These assemblies were then placed over a heated water tank such that the assemblies were subjected to 70°C (158°F) and 95% relative humidity for 28 days.
To see the condition of the fasteners after testing was complete, see Images #3, #4, and #5 below (all photos taken from the report).
Langfang Clear Chemical Product Page
From the &#;Results&#; section of the report: &#;&#;.[I]t appears as though there is no structural difference in the amount of corrosion after the test. All screws show on average the same amount of corrosion on the part of the screw that has been turned through the profiled steel deck. On that part that has not been turned through the profiled steel deck and therefore was in direct contact with the insulation material no corrosion was found.&#;
I tried to contact Dow Building Solutions to get their response to the above BDA Keuringsinstituut report on Kingspan&#;s Kooltherm, but did not hear back.
It dawned on me that I could go to the Kooltherm project right here in Brattleboro, climb into the unfinished attic, and back out some screws to see if there was any corrosion (see Images #6 and #7). The only problem is that those big bad-boy screws were protected by a baked enamel finish, and they have only been in place about 4 or 5 months.
I also remembered that for my blog on the X-Floc cellulose insulation installation system, we used Kooltherm in a wall mockup installed with plain old interior drywall screws (see Images #8 and #9). This wall mockup has been sitting in my quite damp garage for the last three months. There is still no fastener corrosion, so I decided to fill the drywall screw holes with water and put the screws back in (see Image #10). Image #11 shows the same screw a week later: no corrosion, for what it&#;s worth.
I was not aware of the DOE Buildings Technology Office project until Aaron let me know about it: Development of a Bio-based, Inexpensive, Noncorrosive, and Nonflammable Phenolic Foam for Building Insulation (see Image #12). I checked in with the project partner, Atlas Roofing. They reported that there has been no commercialization of this work, either on their part or as evidenced by any new patents they could find based on this project (a key indicator of any project commercialization).
Just before completing this blog, however, I did reach Dr. Jan Kosny, Director of Building Enclosures and Materials at the Fraunhofer Institute U.S.A. Kosny reports:
Not surprisingly, these images (and the testing they represent) put my &#;Wingnut-testing&#; to shame.
Kooltherm remains the &#;real McCoy&#; of currently available phenolic foam rigid insulation in the U.S.
Acidity concerns and corrosion issues have been resolved with Kooltherm phenolic foam rigid insulation. And while competitors to Kooltherm insulation may be several years out, Fraunhofer-led research and development could well mean serious competition in the years to come.
In addition to acting as GBA&#;s technical director, Peter Yost is the Vice President for Technical Services at BuildingGreen in Brattleboro, Vermont. He has been building, researching, teaching, writing, and consulting on high-performance homes for more than twenty years. An experienced trainer and consultant, he&#;s been recognized as NAHB Educator of the Year. Do you have a building science puzzle? Contact Pete here. You can also sign up for BuildingGreen&#;s newsletter to get a free report on insulation, as well as regular posts from Peter.
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