[Greenbuilding] New Type of Chipboard

Wed Sep 24 19:30:46 CDT 2014

Hi

The data is out there even somewhat anecdotally on the site you reference.
All you have to consider is that cellulose insulation is advertised from
many manuf. as 100% recycled newsprint (except for the borates). You also
have to wonder why countries such as England can have an 80-% recycled
content in paper and I doubt we are even at 15%.  Lots of information out
there  - though you may want to look at actual sources and studies than
generic websites. Also lots of information about wool as it is one of the
most researched materials in the world. The wool I am referring to is not
what is used for clothing.  Its true there are not a lot of sheep in the US
of the 4 legged kind - something like only 30 million pounds of fleece
(enough to insulate only 30-50 million cubic ft of space).

The buildinggreen article was a great one but if memory serves (long time
ago) they do not make any reference to  problems and env cost of diverting
value added materials to lesser value usage (which is the point) - If the
environmental cost of producing the pulp and paper to begin with was
factored it - it would not look very good. 

I never said it was bad - just that it was stupid and there are a lot of
stupid (i.e. poorly designed or conceived) objects out there - like cars.
The issue is basic - newsprint is better used to make newsprint as it is a
slightly higher quality tree that is mushed up and chemically treated at
great env and financial cost to make it white and nice. 

So once you have gone to the great trouble (environmental as well as
financial) of bleaching the shit out of trees to make paper smooth and white
would you then stuff it in walls?  If newspaper can be recycled up to 9
times then it should be - before we start considering it as a building
material. Fibre insulation can be made from a lot of materials (many of
which are not suitable for paper products).

It basically goes back to how much deforestation we want to achieve and to
what purpose. Cellulose insul is not a big issue yet as it accounts for only
about 3% of insulation used in the US. Most recycled newspaper is exported
at this point so its hard to say how that industry can grow without
competing for the raw material. I think cellulose insul will simply become a
generic fibre insul product.  We will see a huge interest in insulation in
the coming years as the US tries to meet its emission protocols - one of the
programs being to re-insulate America. 

If you want to get really confused about what is good and what is bad and
what might be bad - check out the following paper - it seems inhalation of
cellulose fibre may be hazardous :
http://www.jniosh.go.jp/en/indu_hel/pdf/IH39_17.pdf

From: Greenbuilding [mailto:greenbuilding-bounces at lists.bioenergylists.org]
On Behalf Of Jeff Martin
Sent: September-24-14 11:08 AM
To: greenbuilding at lists.bioenergylists.org
Subject: Re: [Greenbuilding] New Type of Chipboard

John,

I'm curious about where you're getting your information for your claims
about cellulose insulation.

The numbers I'm seeing are that cellulose insulation only uses a small share
of the recycled newspaper stream (e.g.,
http://www.itseasytorecycle.org/Newspaper.cfm). I'm also not seeing any data
suggesting that the use of recycled newsprint for producing cellulose
insulation is in any way limiting the recycled content of newsprint.
Similarly, I'm not seeing that the production of cellulose insulation
requires wetting and subsequent drying. The numbers I have seen (e.g.,
BuildinGreen's "INSULATION CHOICES") seem to suggest that the energy
requirements for production and the life-time global warming potential of
cellulose insulation are much lower than those of any other widely used
insulation material.

As to wool as an alternative, there may be some small potential for
diverting low-grade wool from landfills and turning it into insulation, but
there really aren't that many sheep in North America and, as far as I know,
the vast majority of their wool gets sold for clothing manufacture, which
seems like a better use for it as an insulating material. If we start
raising sheep for wool as insulation, not only is the insulation going to be
prohibitively expensive, but you'll need to start factoring in all the
negative environmental impacts of all those herds of sheep, and of the
processing and shipping of the wool insulation.

Certainly, cellulose insulation shouldn't be exempted from environmental
concerns, but I'd love to see some data showing that there are
environmentally preferable alternatives for the applications that cellulose
insulation is well-suited.

Jeff

-- 
Jeff Martin
Partner, Service Open2Learn

On 9/22/2014 10:44 AM, John Salmen wrote:

Hi, was sure I've ranted about cellulose before.  The reason I call it
stupid is that is was a stupid use of newsprint. It became popular in the
70's after the first oil crisis for horizontal application - basically
localized backyard operations. At that point very little newsprint was being
recycled. Took about a decade for the insulation it to gain approvals for
vertical application and to meet fire standards etc. - at which point it
became a viable large commercial industry which is only viable when it has a
steady supply of resources - essentially sucking up all the recyclable
newsprint.

Newsprint and paper can be recycled to make new paper something like 7-9
times before the fibres loose quality. Virgin pulp production has not only
been the major cause of deforestation but with the chemicals used and the
energy used is the 3rd largest polluter and the 5th largest energy consumer.

There is a subsequent energy factor in the production of cellulose (wetting,
drying, fluffing) as well as in the production of borates (about 30% of the
content) and latex binders. Another issue is density, settlement, dust, etc.

So we think cellulose is exempt from many env concerns because it is
recycled but in removing recyclable paper from the paper stream inherits the
cfc pollution and other concerns from that industry.

Now wool is still a raw material that is being landfilled in NA in huge
quantities and at a per lb price that is less than the raw material cost for
most insulation....

John

From: Greenbuilding [mailto:greenbuilding-bounces at lists.bioenergylists.org]
On Behalf Of Alan Abrams
Sent: September-21-14 1:46 PM
To: Green Building
Cc: Topher Belknap
Subject: Re: [Greenbuilding] New Type of Chipboard

<Look at cellulose insulation - a stupid product >

John- that is the first time I've heard a serious criticism of cellulose
insulation. I thought it was heroic on my part, to wean myself from foam,
and instead to use chopped up George Will columns. What ho?

-AA

Alan Abrams
certified professional building designer, AIBD
certified passive house consultant, PHIUS

certified passive house builder, PHIUS
cell     202-437-8583
 <mailto:alan at abramsdesignbuild.com> alan at abramsdesignbuild.com
HELICON WORKS  <http://www.heliconworks.com/index2.html> Achitecture and
Education

On Sat, Sep 20, 2014 at 11:56 PM, John Salmen <terrain at shaw.ca> wrote:

I like the 'minimal surplus' ratio and would only say that rather than doing
things wrong we have no clue as to what 'right' is. In the 50's the US
established something called T values for soil erosion - giving permission
for farmers (agribusiness) to be right or not wrong if erosion was something
like .5 to 1mm roughly. They (whoever that is) now puts conventional agri
soil loss at 1mm/yr globally (wherever that is). The question really is what
makes and sustains soil. The only models are native vegetation and one of
the terms applied is 'geologic erosion rate' - being the rate that the decay
of native vegetation matches the rate at which the soil erodes. In the PNW I
think that is now considered to be about 100% i.e. no surplus. I have 50
year old fir trees falling over indiscriminately in my woods because there
is no soil to support them. I have left them in the lying down status.

Can we make engineered building products from corn - sure why not - will it
succeed - probably not in the short term as we already have a huge industry
grinding up quick growing trees and it takes a decade or so for an industry
to develop and few more decades to be supplanted. Look at cellulose
insulation - a stupid product that has consumed far too many resources but
once it became a product the resources were dedicated to it. Same with
engineered wood.

The problem still is scale. I think the average house size in NA is around
2500 sq. ft. which is about 1000 sq. ft. too much for the average family
size. That is where the trees or corn are going. Ironically people are also
consuming about the same ration of calories more than are needed (corn, corn
fed beef?) - which is also soil loss.

I am now using engineered wood extensively in structures as well as metal -
whatever does the work with the least material. I am at the point where if a
client wants to see wood - I can recommend taking a hike in what are left of
our forests.

-----Original Message-----
From: Greenbuilding [mailto:greenbuilding-bounces at lists.bioenergylists.org]
On Behalf Of Topher
Sent: September-20-14 3:42 PM
To: archilogic at yahoo.ca; Green Building
Subject: Re: [Greenbuilding] New Type of Chipboard

On 9/18/2014 9:31 AM, RT wrote:
> So, in addition to depleting nitrogen from the soil (nitrogen being
> essential to leafy vegetative growth), the long decomposition time of
> the very coarse debris hinders planting of the next growing season's crop.

My understanding is that this should be phrased as 'binding up nitrogen
during the decomposition'.  In other words, decomposing woody materials
requires nitrogen in the process, but that nitrogen eventually becomes
available to plants again, it isn't lost (to the atmosphere, for example).

That said, soil chemistry and biology is incredibly complex, and we
generally appear to be doing almost completely wrong.

The basic take away is that removing ANY organic materials from the
biological cycle, beyond a minimal surplus*, is going to reduce the efficacy
of the system.

* - Minimal surplus can be guesstimated at 1/1Millionth of yearly production
(calculated from our current usage of fossil fuels at the rate of a million
years of production per year).

Thank You Kindly,

Topher

--
Topher Belknap
Green Fret Consulting
Kermit didn't know the half of it...
http://www.GreenFret.com/
topher at greenfret.com

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