Articles
Insulating with Closed Cell Spray Foam
Journal of Light Construction
Tom Moore
May 2011
One of my dreams has been to build
a home with wood harvested from
my own land. Last year I finally had the
opportunity, when my wife and I designed
and built a new home on a 25-acre lot in
northern Vermont. We had already cleared
a building site, and we used a portable
sawmill to mill more than 20,000 board
feet of lumber from the mixed hardwood
and softwood trees we had harvested. I'm
a carpenter and cabinetmaker at heart
and was anxious to put all that wood to
use - as siding, trim, flooring, and cabinetry. But I was more concerned about
the home's energy use and long-term performance. We wanted a comfortable, low-
maintenance house that would be easy
to heat, even in our cold and not particularly sunny climate. By building a well-
insulated, airtight shell, we were able to
approach net-zero energy, achieving a
final HERS rating of 4. Here's how we did it.
