There is a hole in your ceiling, Matilda! call About Saving Heat TODAY for the Home COMFORT AUDIT. Uninsulated attics like this one allow heat to leak out of the house in winter and cool air to escape in summer.

Attic ventilation should efficiently release the summer heat and the winter cold and moisture. It is therefore essential to have good insulation and a tight air seal between the ventilated space (your attic) and the conditioned space (your home), to minimize heat loss in winter and heat gain in summer.There is a hole in your ceiling, Matilda! call About Saving Heat TODAY and we can use Top HATS to seal those ceiling recessed light fixture HOLES!Fortunately, attics are one of the easiest areas to insulate, and the least expensive area to add high R-value (heat resistance values) of R-30 to R-40 insulation.

Summer Cooling Problems

Installing attic vents, in combination with a whole house fan and blown cellulose insulation will help keep your home cool at a fraction of the cost of air conditioning.

In the Denver area, there is more absolute heat gain per day through an attic in summer than heat loss through the same attic in winter. On a sunny summer day, with the hot sun blasting directly on your roof, attics can get up to 140 degrees when the rest of the house is around 75 degrees. That's a 65 degree temperature differential! (In the winter, for most homes kept at 70 degrees, it is rarely cold enough in Denver to provide that large of a temperature difference.) With a 140-degree attic, heat gain through an under-insulated ceiling is significant. Hot attics heat up knee walls and ceilings, transferring the unwanted heat back into your living space. Proper attic insulation and ventilation by About Saving Heat Co. will have a major beneficial impact on summer comfort and cooling expense and the improved insulation can actually save you more money and do more for your home's comfort in the summer than in the winter!

 

 

Air-Tite TopHat  This upper ceiling cover is   installed from the open attic above   the recessed light fixture,   and insulation packed up around   the base, away from the hot light,   while insulating and sealing, ceiling holes

Hidden attics, like this one above an extended window in a bedroom, are often overlooked or missed for insulation but can contribute significantly to the comfort of the room they are above.

Winter Heating Problems
Since hot air rises and heat flows from warm to cold, air flowing from your heated house up to your cold attic is a large waster of heat. Additionally, this warm air is moisture-ladden and causes condensation damage to your roof. These are big reasons for properly insulating your attic.

Attics can have hidden air ways and heat transfer conduits - highways for heat and vapor - that need to be taken care of before the attic is insulated. Some of these are: recessed lights, dropped ceilings, plumbing and electrical chases, chimneys, exhaust fans, walls adjacent to cathedral ceilings and air ducts. These tricky areas can be responsible for more heat transfer than the entire flat surface of your attic. One example of this is recessed lights, which are like holes in your ceilings. The light covers are designed to cool off the bulbs by letting air flow from the house to the attic and around the light bulb, through holes in the cans. These lights require a 3-inch clearance (national electric code) of insulation leaving 1 square-foot of uninsulated ceiling space. The heat lost from this one square-foot space occupied from each recessed light equals the heat loss through 100 square feet of well-insulated attic. The heat lost from ten recessed lights without proper treatment, equals as much heat loss as a 1000 square foot insulated attic!

Airtight top hats for recessed lights, designed and installed (or sold to the do-it-yourselfers) by About Saving Heat are fire-rated air barriers for recessed lights. They dissipate built-up heat through aluminum caps by conduction and convection, not air infiltration.

About Saving Heat will not only insulate your attic, but will also properly ventilate and prepare your attic for your best heat performance and value. Let our experienced crew and our state-of-the -art equipment professionally insulate your attic.

Once the problem areas are taken care of, conductive heat loss through the ceiling will be even, and direct air infiltration will be minimal. Therefore adding attic insulation will generally have a big impact on your energy bills as well as on your comfort.