This European Standard specifies the equipment and procedures for determining the water vapour transmission rate, water vapour permeance and water vapour permeability of test specimens in the steady state under different sets of specified test conditions. It is applicable to thermal insulating products.

It is intended to be used for homogeneous materials and for products which may contain integral skins or facings of different material(s).

A material is considered to be homogeneous, with regard to mass distribution, if its density is approximately the same throughout, i.e. if the measured density values are close to its mean density.

This test method is not normally used for determining the water vapour transmission properties of single, separate vapour barriers (of high diffusion resistance), such as prefabricated films, foils, membranes or sheets, due to the long duration of the test. For products with a vapour retarder or barrier with a water vapour diffusion equivalent air layer thicknesss_d ≥ 1 000 m (see 3.6) other test methods e.g. IR-detection can be used for measuring the single separate vapour retarder or barrier, provided that the results obtained are in the same range as the values measured in accordance with this standard.

The water vapour transmission rate and permeance values are specific to the test specimen (i.e. the product) thickness tested. For homogeneous products, the water vapour permeability is a property of the material.