Warm up and keep costs down with wall insulation
Save money and energy by insulating the outside walls of your home
Last updated on
May 23, 2022 13:50
In an uninsulated home, 33% of the heat is lost through the walls. You heard that right, a third of the heat you’re paying for is escaping. Insulating the walls is a major step towards saving money and energy.
Different walls in different homes are made up of different stuff. Houses in the UK are generally either solid or cavity walls. First step is to find out which you have:
If you have cavity walls, you can insulate them by injecting insulation material from the outside in. Imagine drawing a clock face on your wall – the insulation would be injected into the wall at 12, 3, 6 and 9 o’clock. After the work is finished, the holes are covered in cement – you wouldn’t know they were ever there.
It’s a job you can’t do yourself, but an average house shouldn’t take a registered installer more than a couple of hours.
Insulating solid walls is a bigger job. You can get external or internal wall insulation – meaning you can insulate the outside or the inside of your wall.
This involves layering material (like plasterboard) over your wall inside. This internal option has a few advantages:
This means fixing insulation to the outside of the building. If your wall is old or cracked it’ll have to be repaired first. Here are the advantages:
The price depends on the condition of the walls and of course, property size.
Cavity wall insulation generally costs around £200 per each two storey wall. So, a mid-terraced house would cost around £400 and a detached home would be around £800.
Solid wall insulation is more expensive. Internal wall insulation ranges from around £4,000 to £15,000 and external wall insulation from £7,000 to £20,000+.
There’s no denying that wall insulation comes with a hefty price tag, but savings can be as high as £375 a year.
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