Better insulation gets the seal of approval

• 35 % reduction in energy consumption using new insulating materials
• The investment saves € 2 300 annually

A new factory in Germany enlisted the support of the EcoCommercial Building Programme (ECB) to analyse potential energy savings by improving the insulation of walls, windows and the roof.

The target temperature for the mid-sized factory (20 m x 60 m x 6 m) was set at 17°C. The ECB study compared a regular building that meets the 2009 German (i.e. EnEV 2009) standard with a building that demonstrates improved thermal qualities.

The regular building was equipped with steel-sandwich-elements with 6 cm-thick PU-insulation and a heat transfer coefficient of U=0.39 W/m²K for the walls and roof. The improved version featured 16 cm-thick insulation and a U-value of 0.15 W/m²K. The windows of the regular version feature a U-value of 2.00 W/m²K, whereas the improved version recorded a U-value of 0.98 W/m²K. Improving only the thermal properties of these elements a reduction in energy consumption for heating of 35 % could be gained.

Key results

The total savings potential of the better-insulated building amount to 28.6 MWh of energy and € 2 300 per year. The additional cost for the improved insulation was calculated to be € 32 000 with a payback time of 11 years.