Crawl Space Insulation Houston
Crawl Space Insulation
Homeowners make their homes more comfortable and less expensive to heat and cool with crawl space insulation from First Defense Insulation.
Often humid and unclean, crawl spaces tend to be an area that most homeowners avoid. Pier and Beam construction can possibly lead to major problems in the buildings envelope. Air leakage leads to uncomfortable cold floors, energy loss, and poor indoor air quality.
First Defense Insulation specializes in all things crawl space! If you have issues with uncomfortable floors, rising utility cost, or poor indoor air quality, we have the solutions. Contact us today to get a Free consultation and estimate!
What can be done about your crawl space?
Most people don’t realize the bigger impact a homes energy efficiency has with relation to the crawl space. Insulation is often overlooked when homeowners are looking to reduce heating and cooling cost and be more comfortable in their homes.
Houston, Tx crawl spaces can be humid, dirty, and difficult to access. Unique challenges to repair problems often keeps homeowners from addressing issues. There are many products and methods that are available to help mitigate problems.
First Defense Insulation offers proven solutions for crawl space insulation and encapsulation.
Crawl Space Problems
Pier and Beam Homes are designed with floors that have outside air under them. Common issues include air leakage through the floor and conductive heat gain or loss depending on the season. Traditionally, fiberglass batt insulation was used between the floor joist. Fiberglas tends to absorb moisture, which causes loss of R-value and can cause the batt to fall out of place rendering it totally ineffective. Sagging fiberglass pulls away from the subfloor and allows air to get around the material, known as “thermal bypass”. Fiberglass that becomes damp is a favorite breeding ground for pest and mold.
When outside air flows under a floor in the summer, humid and moist air can enter the envelope of the home through cracks, gaps, and penetrations. During winter, cold dry air can enter the home. Stopping unwanted air movement into the home becomes very important. Unfortunately, too many crawl spaces have the incorrect type of insulation or even worse no insulation at all. A poorly or uninsulated crawl space is likely to be excessively damp, encouraging mold growth and wood rot.
Outside air is rarely the kind of air that you want flowing into your crawl space. Hot and humid during summer, cold in the winter, and damp during wet weather. As hot, humid summer air enters a cooler crawl space, the humidity in the air condensates, collecting on insulation and wood surfaces. Wet fiberglass loses much of its insular quality, and becomes weighed down — sagging and falling down from the joists in useless heaps.
If a crawl space floods or maintains high humidity levels, mold can begin to grow on everything organic: Wood, components of fiberglass, and stored items
If left unchecked, mold will damage insulation and weaken structural wood. Over time, damage may cause the home to sag downwards causing floors to become uneven, allowing musty odors from the crawl space into the homes indoor environment.
Home Sweet Home for a wide variety of pest– termites, rats, mice, carpenter ants, cockroaches, and moore! Crawl spaces offers shelter, food, year-round temperature, and moisture. The key to controlling these pests in your home depends on eliminating as many of their life essentials as possible. By sealing, insulating, and dehumidifying a crawl space, you eliminate their entrance points into your home and remove the life-sustaining moisture that otherwise keeps them living and breeding.
Most people don’t realize the bigger impact a homes energy efficiency has with relation to the crawl space. Insulation is often overlooked when homeowners are looking to reduce heating and cooling cost and be more comfortable in their homes.
Houston, Tx crawl spaces can be humid, dirty, and difficult to access. Unique challenges to repair problems often keeps homeowners from addressing issues. There are many products and methods that are available to help mitigate problems.
First Defense Insulation offers proven solutions for crawl space insulation and encapsulation.
How we can insulate and improve your crawl space
You don’t have to put up with high utility cost , cold floors, cupped or warped floors, uncomfortable rooms caused by poor crawl space insulation. First Defense Insulation will carefully evaluate your home and recommend the best solutions for your needs. We install quality insulation that’s proven to make homes more comfortable and efficient.
Closed Cell spray foam is one of the most efficient insulating materials available. Known for its superior R-Value per inch, closed cell also offers moisture drive protection from the hot and humid climates of Texas. Two inches of closed-cell spray polyurethane foam insulation will minimize air infiltration, exfiltration, convection, conduction and control solar driven moisture in the building envelope. Closed cell is a great solution for protecting our homes; however, if only applied to the subfloor, hot humid air will still enter the crawlspace- which can lead to other problems. Free crawl space evaluations are available to address which solution route best serves your crawl space.
Insulate crawl space walls and floor
SilverGlo on crawl space walls and TerraBlock on crawl space floor.
When homeowners want the most comfort and energy efficiency benefits possible, top performing insulation is key. Houston, Tx crawl spaces are known for their damp environment. That’s why we offer SilverGlo rigid foam insulation.
Silver Glo rigid foam doesn’t lose R-value, absorb moisture, or provide a food source for mold growth. For ultimate energy savings, SilverGlo comes with a reflective coating which makes it an effective radiant barrier. Our install specialist tape over each seam between boards, offering an excellent air barrier.
Seal the crawl space
Crawl space sealed with the CleanSpace System.
Reducing moisture and relative humidity in the crawl space is paramount. We install our CleanSpace liner over the floors and walls of the crawl space. To keep out unconditioned air, we install closed cell spray foam or rigid foam board in the rim joist. Encapsulating the crawl space combined with air sealing provides for a comfortable and energy efficient home. Any excess moister can be addressed with our crawl space dehumidifier. For wet crawl spaces, we can recommend the right drainage system and offer products for water leakage.
- Keep water out of the crawl space. Traditionally, builders don’t pay a lot of attention to stating water in the crawl space. After all, people seldom go down there; however, not addressing this issue is increasing the moisture load in the home which can contribute to odors and feed mold growth. Our Crawl Space drainage pump is called SmartSump.
- Remediate any mold. It’s never a good idea to hire a contractor to fix your crawl space without addressing any mold first. Why seal up mold into the crawl space- Always address any mold fist! We use our proprietary Mold-X and Mold-X Botanical to eliminate and prevent future growth.
- Protect with a vapor barrier. Closed Cell Spray foam is an effective and popular vapor barrier. For the best results, our heavy duty 20mil CleanSpace encapsulation liner is installed across the ground, walls, and piers. The liner edges are sealed to prevent any moisture intrusion.
- Address crawl space vents. Allowing humid air into the crawl space to circulate is a poor design. Vents, access doors, and air leaks need to be sealed. Everlast Vent Covers! A vent cover that doesn’t rust or rot! We also use SilverGlo.
- Air seal and insulate rim joist and walls. Regulating temperature inside the crawlspace is achieved by stopping air movement into the crawl space and insulating against the season’s harsh conditions. Spray foam Insulation is a great choice. Using spray foam also allows the removal of the old, nasty, and contaminated fiberglass batt from the floor cavities
- Crawl Space Dehumidification. After all that work, you want a DRY Crawl Space. We offer the SaniDry Sedona dehumidifier. Installed in the crawl space and drained to a sump or the outside with condensate pump. Able to remove an incredible 100 pints of water per day only using 5.9 amps of electricity. The result, a great crawl space you can actually use all the while maintaining 50%-60% RH all year long which give mold no chance!