I just returned from holiday and my neighbour told me that a company will be providing polybead cavity wall insulation to his home for free next week. This is apparently part of the Warmfront campaign.
Should I be wary of this? Is it bone fide or is it a scam. Nothing in this life is free, normally. There's always a catch and the radio and TV programmes are full of homeowners, time-sharers, part-equity owners and so on, who have been conned.
Note: According to said neighbour, this work will be carried out completely without any charge to him whatsoever.
Meanwhile I spoke to another neighbour, who saw how these houses were constructed to Silver Certification standard, with integral insulation within the cavity. As she said, polybead insulation could cause unforeseen problems with condensation, mould etc, and I reckon she's got a point. Also, where is it going to get blown into if the cavity already has block insulation?
I have often wondered why my property seems to be very warm all year round. Now I know why.
Its paid out of the same tax that solar panel FITs are paid from. All the large energy suppliers have to contribute or face fines.
Recently BG would pay you to have "free" insulation and the only qualification you needed was your post code. If they didn't meet their quota they would have been fined.
My house was built in 2004 to Silver Certification standard. According to neighbours who witnessed the construction of these 40 properties, great care was taken during construction to install between-cavity insulation blocks. Now I have people calling who want to insulate my home for free by blowing polybead granules through holes drilled through the brickwork.
But at least one neighbour has said that he is not having his property done, given that it is already well-insulated. His argument is that the architect and builder would have planned these houses with insulation in mind and to meet the Silver Certification standard. That would also include necessary ventilation to prevent the build-up of condensation. By adding probably unnecessary extra insulation in the form of polybead granules, this could upset the balance between insulation and ventilation. That sounds to me like a sensible argument, along the lines of: if it ain't broke, don't fix it. I wouldn't want to have to pay for the removal of the granules later if condensation turned out to be a problem.
I have just dug out the NHBC "Guide to your new home" booklet that was given to me when I moved into to this new property. In the section on page 14 "How your new home was built" there are two types of thermal insulation mentioned for masonry walls: fully fill and partially fill, with illustrations to differentiate the two types. In the case of fully fill, which is what this property has, there is no space left for any blown-in extra insulation, while under "partially fill" the following warning is given in bold: "The air space left between partial cavity insulation and the outer leaf should never be filled with injected insulation material."
When said neighbours were confronted by the rep from the insulation company, he insisted that they were wrong and that all houses could usefully have the additional insulation. I missed him because I was on holiday. Now I am firmly of the opinion that the company and other similar companies are merely ticking boxes in order to obtain government money.
A former work colleague was contacted by one of these people. he told them not to come, but they insisted. .. and then found he didn't have cavity walls.
Given that the service, for those who take it up, is free (yeah, I know that taxpapyers actually fund the schemes), and given that the installer can always claim, if faced with an accusation by the home owner that the work was shoddily done, "Well, it was free, wasn't it!"
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