Cellulose insulation: excellent fire resistance

Image credit: The University of Maine Technology

Our cellulose insulation material, made from recycled newspaper, is one of the best insulations in a fire.

This is well illustrated in this video, an example of a popular party-trick for cellulose installers, where a coin is melted on a handful of the insulation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qcYluf8VSF0. The material is charred by the blowtorch, but this charring actually further enhances the barrier to fire.

Another good illustration is this experiment conducted by a U.S. fire department investigating the time for a fire in a house to cause collapse, comparing insulations of cellulose, fibreglass, and uninsulated: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lAPPn53JtHQ.

Other insulation materials are less safe in a fire.

Whereas our cellulose acts like a fire blanket, fibreglass insulation does not have the same density and gives very little benefit in a fire.

Another material, PIR foam, played a major role in the tragic Grenfell high-rise building fire of 2017, made worse by certain design details of the cladding system. Although specified to be fire resistant, this proved to be wrong. Highly toxic gases are produced by PIR foam in a fire, along with dense black smoke.

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