Saving energy from the bottom up
by Tom
(Minnesota)
The crawl space in my fixer upper home was causing a number of problems in my home each winter, from cold floors to freezing pipes. I needed a way to fix both problems...
I purchased a home a number of years ago that was a fixer upper. I had a number of problems, one of which was on an addition where the floors were freezing cold to walk on, and the pipes froze in winter. This was an obvious efficiency concern and I found a way to fix the problem, which could be useful for any home that has a crawl space.
When I entered the crawl space I noticed that the foundation had settled a little and the house wasn’t sitting properly on its footings. The first step which had nothing to do with energy conservation was to lift and level the addition. Once I did this I increased the gap between the house and the foundation. I went to my local building supply store and purchased 2" polystyrene insulation in 4x8 sheets. I cut them down to 2x8 sheets as I did not want to dig down that far into my foundation. I also picked up 2 mil plastic sheets and some canned expanding foam.
In the crawl space I prepped by digging down low enough to clear 2 feet from the floor joists down to the dirt against the foundation. I then laid out the 2mil plastic to cover the dirt. The plastic will act as a moisture barrier and it made working in the crawl space a lot cleaner. Next I took the foam and placed it along the foundation making sure it was flush and touched the floor joists and back-filled the dirt tucking the plastic in the best I could. Once all the outer walls were covered with foam I took the expanding foam and filled the gaps particularly at the top at the floor joists.
This is a common practice especially on the outsides of homes. Although I choose to do the inside you could just as well dig down from the outside and to the same thing. The only exception is you may want to invest in something to protect the foam and make it more presentable. Exposed foam wont last very long outside and isn’t very appealing. From the inside these concerns aren’t as important.
After I was all done, I was now able to use this crawl space as a storage area since it was now covered with plastic. The next winter the floor was a lot warmer and the pipes never froze. I did notice a slight decrease in my heating bill as a result. So if you own an older fixer upper in a colder climate and your home has a crawl space, you definitely want to take a look and see if maybe you may be loosing heat from below.
© Green Energy Efficient Homes 2009 Privacy policy