In order to earn 0.5 pt for recycled-content insulation, 90% or more of the bulk insulation products installed in the home (calculated as a percentage of the total surface area -- walls, roof, floor -- covered by insulation) must have a minimum of 20% recycled content. No weighted averaging may be used (i.e., the requirement is not met if >10% of the insulation used contains recycled content less than 20%, regardless of the recycled content of the remainder of the insulation). The reason for this ruling is that the inclusion of recycled content in new products has not been shown consistently to result in superior environmental performance, and increased percentages of recycled content do not correlate predictably with higher levels of environmental performance.
Updated 10/1/13 for rating system applicability.