Insulation industry news from Global Insulation

US: Hennecke Group, a manufacturer and supplier of polyurethane processing equipment and plants, has moved its North American headquarters to a new plant in Bridgeville, Pennsylvania. The new headquarters features more office and conference space, a research and development laboratory, a parts warehouse and areas for machinery repair and mixhead rebuilding services.

"This building better represents the innovation and leading polyurethane technology that we provide," said Lutz Heidrich, General Manager of Hennecke. He added that the new plant used some of the materials that its customers produce in its construction. This includes using foil-faced polyiso panel insulation made by Hunter Panels, part of Carlisle Construction Materials.

Hennecke manufactures equipment and supplies plants that make a variety of polyurethane-based products for the construction industries and other sectors. It operates facilities in Italy, Brazil, Mexico, China, Singapore, South Korea, India and Russia.

Germany: Va-Q-Tec’s revenue grew by 8% year-on-year to Euro50.7m in 2018 from Euro46.9m in 2017. Sales from its Products business, including vacuum insulation panels (VIP) and phase change materials (PCM), increased by 12% to Euro20.1m from Euro18m. However, its earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) fell by 58% to Euro3m from Euro7.2m. It blamed the fall in earnings on a rise in sales from its lower-margin Products business and investment costs in the company generally.

“Even though business trends in 2018 fell short of our expectations, the outlook at the end of the year brightened considerably. We have completed all of our major growth investments, we have achieved important progress with projects for major customers,” said Stefan Döhmen, the chief financial officer (CFO) of Va-Q-Tec.

UK: SIG’s revenue fell by 1.2% year-on-year to Euro3.13bn in 2018 from Euro3.17bn in 2017. Its profit before tax rose by 8.5% to Euro87.8m from Euro80.9m. The group blamed its falling sales on ‘challenging’ market conditions and a focus on profit over sales volumes. It reported a weakening construction market in 2018 and its UK and Ireland sales fell by 10.6%. Despite slowing markets in France and Germany, its mainland Europe sales remained stable in 2018.

“As expected, our transformation strategy began to deliver during the year and we saw significant operational and financial progress in the second half. Despite challenging market conditions and lower revenue in our largest markets, our focus on pricing and profitability over volume, coupled with tighter control over operating costs, has enabled us to grow our gross margins and profit,” said chief executive officer (CEO) Meinie Oldersma.

UK: Knauf Insulation’s Earthwool RainScreen Slab product has been certified by the British Board of Agrément (BBA) for use in high-rise residential applications. The BBA certification follows the December 2018 update to Approved Document B, which mandates the use of non-combustible materials achieving a Euroclass Reaction to Fire Classification of A1 or A2 s1-d0 in the external walls of certain buildings over 18m in height.

“Non-combustible insulation is the best choice for architects, specifiers and contractors as it will not contribute to the development or spread of fire” said Steve Smith, Head of Product Management and Business Intelligence at Knauf Insulation.

UK/France: A project between the University of Bath, University of Brighton, UniLaSalle in Rouen and five other academic and non-academic partners, and funded under the Interreg VA France (Channel) England programme, is investigating the performance of a range of waste materials and bio-based co-products as alternative building insulation materials. Three different materials are being evaluated: wheat straw bales, rapeseed stalks (processed into bio-composite) and recycled duvets.

A research team at the University of Bath is testing and comparing the thermal performance of each of the insulation materials by constructing three identical prototype wall panels, each containing one of the materials. Their performances will be compared and contrasted with each other as well as against industry standard insulation used currently in most buildings. The panels are 150mm thick by 1.1m2 and fitted with 9mm plywood either side, similar to how insulation is commonly installed within buildings. Each panel contains a number of probes to measure relative humidity, interior and exterior temperature, and heat flux. The panels will undergo six weeks of consecutive testing in an environmental chamber at the University’s Building Research Park. There will be two tests – a steady state and a non-steady state temperature test.

“This is the first time these materials will have been tested in such a robust scientific way, allowing us to accurately assess their thermal performance against each other as well as against industry standard insulation,” said Shawn Platt, Research Associate in the University of Bath’s Department of Architecture & Civil Engineering.