As the name implies, a sunroom is designed to provide warmth, ambience, and the pleasant, feel-good factor that you get from a fine summer’s day.
Sunrooms are designed to provide you with a space to enjoy the warmth of the sun and unobstructed views outdoors, while warm and cozy indoors away from the elements. Regardless of whether you opt for a three-season sunroom or an all-season sunroom, it’s essential that you make it as warm and inviting as possible. This is where it becomes vital to adequately insulate your sunroom.
A well-insulated sunroom is not only important for keeping warm during the colder seasons, it’s also important for helping to keep you cool during the hot summer months. On top of that, it will also save you a bundle in energy costs. Insulating a sunroom, however, is easier said than done, which is why we’ve compiled this article today.
Here are several sunroom insulation tips to save on energy costs.
Select the Correct Insulation Material
The good thing about insulating a sunroom nowadays, is the fact that you have so many different options when it comes to insulation.
While there are plenty of different insulation material options to suit all budgets and preferences, it’s important that you make the right choice for your specific sunroom. If you simply choose the cheapest option, it could be completely wrong for the design and layout of your sunroom, meaning it doesn’t provide enough insulation and, ultimately, you’ll end up spending more.
Some popular choices when it comes to insulation include:
- Fiberglass
- Rigid foam
- Spray foam
- Weather stripping
- Caulk
- Foam board
Rather than just settling on one, most people will combine different insulation materials when insulating a sunroom, so be sure to consider doing that, as different materials work better on different surfaces.
Focus on Doors and Windows
While there is a lot more science to it than this, the basic premise of insulating a room is to keep it at a constant, pleasurable temperature and avoid wasting energy. That means keeping it warm in the winter, and cool in the summer.
In order to maintain the temperature of a room, you need to prevent either warm or cold air from entering the room, and prevent warm or cool air from escaping the room.
Without question, doors and windows on a sunroom are its weak points when it comes to insulation, so be sure to really focus on these. If they are single pane, go ahead and replace the glass as this will make a huge difference and will pay for itself in no time.
On top of the glass, check the seals. Look for visible damage and see if you can feel air entering the room. If you can feel a cool breeze getting in through a crack in the seal, replacing your seals will also make an enormous difference.
Inspect the Floor
One of the most common mistakes that people make when it comes to insulating a sunroom, is failing to inspect the floor.
They’ll spend thousands of dollars on insulating the walls, replacing the seals, adding thicker glass, yet in the winter they’ll still find that the room is simply too cold to sit in for a lengthy period of time. That’s likely because they didn’t check the floor.
Check the floor for any cracks or visible signs of damage, and see if you can feel any air entering the room. Sunroom floors are notorious for heat loss, and also allowing cold air to enter the room, especially if built over a crawlspace.
Add a layer of insulation under the floor to help keep the room at a pleasurable temperature and if possible, you can even consider underfloor heating.
Consider Alternative Heating and Cooling Solutions
Regardless of how well insulated your sunroom may be, during extremely cold snaps, or during heatwaves, you may find that the room is still either too cold or too warm to sit in for a long time. This is where alternative cooling and heating solutions can be useful.
If you don’t mind it for a few weeks out of the year, a simple portable space heater could offer enough warmth to leave the sunroom cozy and inviting, without costing a fortune. Another option would be a simple electric fireplace, or even potentially a professionally installed woodburning stove.
In the summer, either a portable AC unit, or even a simple fan can help cool down you, and the room in general.
Monitor Your Energy Usage
Thanks to the wonders of modern technology, it’s now easier than ever to get an overview of our energy usage and monitor just how much energy we’re using and how much it is costing us.
Before insulating your sunroom, monitor your energy usage over the last several seasons and then go ahead and compare that to your energy usage after you’ve insulated your sunroom. If it has been sufficiently insulated, you should find that your energy usage has dropped considerably after insulating.
Work With the Seasons
Another few ways in which you can easily insulate your sunroom is to make seasonal changes.
During the summer for example, your goal is to keep the room cool. You can do this by adding reflective window coverings which reflect the heat, rather than allowing it to penetrate into the room.
During the winter, you can add things like thermal blinds or curtains, which helps to trap warm air inside and prevent it from escaping. As the weather warms up, you can take these down and change them to summer curtains or blinds.
Leave It to The Pros
Finally, for anybody looking to seriously reduce their energy consumption and create a warm and inviting sunroom for all seasons, it might be worth hiring professional contractors and leaving things to them.
Professionals will not only have access to the best materials, they’ll also know exactly which materials to use and where, what to look for, what to protect against, and which areas to really focus on.
Not only that, but they’ll also help you to save money on energy as your energy costs will almost certainly drop after having your sunroom professionally insulated.