If you want eco-friendly (whatever that is) Insulation those packing boxes worked amazingly well and were economical to use. 

I bought bees from a beekeeper in Southern Ontario back in the 1970s and we had trouble finding any dead or weak hives after going through many crates. The beekeeper wintered in singles, both standards and jumbos.

The colonies were all uniformly in excellent condition in spring. 

I bought 100 and trucked them to Alberta,  split them and still made a super a honey on each split on foundation in May.  That is an unusual feat.

The packing boxes were about 4 feet square and maybe three feet high and made of  any old 4 inch boards.  Each had a telescopoing lid that covered the whole box. The hives inside faced all four ways with a small gap between them. In summer, the hives sat outside on extending 2x4 floor joists.

He kept enough shavings year around in each box to cover the hives when he lifted them in. 

The hives were as I say mostly singles, but there were a few doubles and each brood box had only a burlap sack and five inches or more of shavings over the frames.

I was told that the secret was not to make the boxes airtight and to make sure that there was of air filtration through the shavings.

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