Which is a better insulator wood or Styrofoam?

The wood blocked at least 10 degrees more heat than styrofoam or silica aerogel, which had been awarded the Guinness World Record for 'best insulator'. The nanowood, which is white, also effectively reflects sunlight.

aero.umd.edu - Sturdy Insulator Made of Wood - UMD aerospace engineering

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Sturdy Insulator Made of Wood

COLLEGE PARK-- Engineers at the University of Maryland have created a new material that’s as insulating as Styrofoam, but stronger and much more environmentally friendly. “This can insulate better than most other current thermal insulators, including Styrofoam. It is extremely promising to be used as energy efficient building materials,” said Tian Li, a postdoc student with Liangbing Hu’s group in the UMD department of materials science and engineering. She was named to Forbes Magazine’s “30 under 30” list of accomplished young adults in 2018. Wood “conducts” heat along the channels that were used when the tree was alive to shuttle water and nutrients from roots to leaves. However, heat trying to cross the wood grain is blocked. With the wood oriented in the right direction, heat could be blocked or transmitted as the designer desires. To test how much heat was insulated, they measured the temperature on one side of the nanowood, while on the other side of the wood, shining a light in one test and applying heat in another test. The nanowood insulated better in both cases. The wood blocked at least 10 degrees more heat than styrofoam or silica aerogel, which had been awarded the Guinness World Record for ‘best insulator’. The nanowood, which is white, also effectively reflects sunlight. They also tried to crush it and found that, in one direction, the nanowood was 30 times stronger than commercially used thermal insulation materials such as Styrofoam, aerogel or other foams made of cellulose. Nanowood’s tiny fibers don’t cause allergic reactions or irritate lung tissues, unlike glass or wool insulators. The secret to the nanowood is the removal of lignin, the part that makes it brown and rigid. The team also removed some of the short fibers that tangle themselves in with the cellulose fibers that make up the scaffolding-like base structure of the wood. The aligned cellulose fibers then bond with each other and results in a high mechanical strength. The team in the US was assisted by Lars Wågberg of the KTH Royal Institute of Technology, in Stockholm, Sweden. This member of the Wallenberg Wood Science Centre helped analyze the behavior of cellulose fibers in the nanowood. “My research program experiments with nature’s nanotechnology that we see in wood,” said Liangbing Hu, an associate professor in the department of materials science and engineering at the University of Maryland, a member of the Maryland Energy Innovation Institute, and a member of the Maryland NanoCenter. “We are reinventing ways to use wood that could be useful in constructing energy efficient and environmentally friendly homes.” These wood-based nanotechnologies are being commercialized through Inventwood, a UMD spinoff company of Hu’s research group. The team has made the insulating nanowood in blocks and in a thin, flexible or rollable, form.

‘Anisotropic, lightweight, strong, and super thermally insulating nanowood with naturally aligned nanocellulose’

http://dx.doi.org/

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Is wood a good insulator for cold?

Wood is a natural insulator. Wood has a lower thermal conductivity compared to concrete, steel-frame and masonry construction and is ideally suited to energy-efficient design. As a natural insulator, it provides some of the world's coldest climates with warm and comfortable dwellings.

naturallywood.com - Wood's thermal performance | Building Performance

Wood’s prefabricated, Passive House advantage

Prefabrication of wood buildings in factory settings can further improve thermal performance by delivering a precise fit that is tested and is airtight. With these new approaches, wood buildings are meeting and exceeding the requirements of new energy and voluntary programs, such as Passive House. Passive House (Passivhaus) is considered to be the most rigorous voluntary energy-based standard in the design and construction industry today. It is a holistic approach to energy efficiency that considers all aspects of a structure. This includes data on local weather and solar orientation along with design, foundation, framing, and insulation systems to reduce or even eliminate thermal bridging. This means using building materials that have low thermal conductivities. By nature, wood is ideal for this, made up of thousands of open cells that make it difficult to conduct heat. Furthermore, highly energy efficient, airtight buildings can be achieved using prefabricated timber building systems cut and assembled with precision within a controlled environment. Unnecessary framing is eliminated and replaced with insulation to optimize energy performance. Dense recycled wood fibre panels can replace conventional insulation while providing sound reduction while boosting thermal mass.

BC Passive House Factory, Pemberton

Photo credit: Ema Peter Photography

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