In the energy-efficient renovation of old and especially half-timbered buildings, there are special requirements for the insulation materials used. Under the direction of the Büro für Denkmalpflege und Baustoffentwicklung of Postmünster, Germany, it has now been demon strated that an energy-efficient upgrade with a new type of insulation made of typha (cattail) panels is compatible with historic building preservation.

The company typha technik Naturbaustoffe of Schönau, Germany, together with the Fraunhofer Institut für
Bauphysik (IBP) of Valley, Germany, used cattails, tough swamp plants, to develop a magnesite-based, isotropic typha panel material. The new typha panels were successfully implemented in a model procedure in Nürnberg for the renovation of a historically protected, late 17th-century half-timbered building.

Thus an insulation material is now available which
possesses a number of additional desirable qualities:

• Unique combination of support- and insulating characteristics
• Good fire-, sound, and summertime heat insulation
• Convenient and simple workability
• Suitable for surface use in contact with historical substances
• Relatively diffusion-open and capillary-active
• Production with low energy consumption

In addition, typha can make further contributions to environmental protection, for example:

• Bonding of CO₂ when grown on fen soils
• Economically productive alternative as a permanent crop in moor areas and riparian zones
• Purification of waste-polluted surface water
• Cropland appropriate as retention surface for flood protection

Project Operation:
typha technik Naturbaustoffe, Schönau
E-Mail: w.theuerkorn@gmail.com
www.typhatechnik.com

Cooperation Partner:
Altstadtfreunde Nürnberg e. V., Nürnberg
www.altstadtfreunde-nuernberg.de

Architekturbüro Fritsch-Knodt-Klug, Nürnberg
www.fritsch-knodt-klug.de

Fraunhofer Institut für Bauphysik (IBP)
www.ibp.fraunhofer.de

Bayerisches Landesamt für Denkmalpflege
www.blfd.bayern.de

Ref. 27918