New Best Practice Guide to Support Safe, High-Quality Residential Insulation Programs

Insulation Australasia (IA), in collaboration with the Insulation Council of Australia and New Zealand (ICANZ), has released the Best Practice Guide for Procurement, Oversight and Delivery of Residential Insulation Programs.

Australia still has an estimated eight million homes with insufficient insulation, and governments across the country continue to invest in energy efficiency programs. The guide provides a practical, technically grounded reference to help ensure these programs deliver safe, durable and cost-effective outcomes.

Drawing on the lessons of the Commonwealth Home Insulation Program, the guide supports a shift from volume-driven delivery to outcomes-based program design. It recommends that programs embed safety from the outset, base scope on pre-installation assessment of actual site conditions, structure procurement around defined and funded activities rather than bundled rates, and include independent inspection to verify real-world results.

The guide covers:

  • Safety-led program design and product-agnostic procurement
  • Assessment of existing insulation and when removal is required
  • Electrical safety, including pre-installation inspection and IC-rated downlights
  • Working at heights and roof access
  • Quality assurance, in-progress and post-installation inspection
  • Recommended tender line-item categories

The guide is written for government procurement teams, program administrators and energy efficiency agencies, as well as insulation businesses delivering, or seeking to deliver, government-funded programs. It complements and operationalises the Insulation Installation Roadmap released by the Affiliated Insulation Industry Coalition (AIIC) and the Energy Efficiency Council (EEC) in September 2024.

Best Practice Guide for Procurement, Oversight and Delivery of Residential Insulation Programs

Download the Best Practice Guide (PDF)

More IA compliance and procurement resources are available in our Technical Reports section.