goverment recommendations

DOE/CE-0180

Department of Energy
Assistant Secretary
Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy

R-Value Recommendations for Existing Buildings

Heating System: Natural Gas Furnace
Cooling System: Electric Air Conditioning
First 3 digits of ZIP code: 605
Location: South_Chicago_Sub., IL

Insulation Location	R-Value^*	Notes
Attic	38	-
Wood frame wall cavity	11	Blow insulation into any uninsulated exterior wall cavity.
Floor	19	Over unheated, uninsulated space.
Crawl space wall	19	Crawl space walls are only insulated if the crawl space is unvented and the floor above the crawl space is uninsulated.
Basement wall interior	11	-
Insulative sheathing on empty wall	7	Recommendation assumes that the exterior siding was removed for other purpose, i.e., does not include any consideration of the cost of removing and replacing the exterior siding.
Add insulative sheathing to R11 wall	5

^* R-values have units of F-ft²-h/Btu. The recommended R-values were produced using the ZIP-Code computer program. The recommendations are based on an analysis of cost effectiveness, using average local energy prices, regional average insulation costs, equipment efficiencies, climate factors, and energy savings for both the heating and cooling seasons.