Green house building

The way we humans are currently living isn’t going to be sustainable for long. This is a fact that we’re becoming more and more aware of every day. Because of this, green home design is becoming a more and more mainstream part of the housing market. Some experts predict that green home design will soon make up a huge slice of the real estate industry.

In the United States, homes create 38% of the total carbon emissions. So in the fight on global warming, how we choose to build our homes (with green home design or without it) is going to have a huge effect on our future. If you’re looking to incorporate a bit of green home design, there are a hundred small things you can do to green-up your home. But for those into truly lowering their home’s impact on the environment, there are four basic green home design rules to follow.

Green Home Design Rule 1: Smaller is Better

Large homes are a symbol of wealth, status, and success. But large homes use up an incredible amount of energy for heating and cooling– and this energy generally comes from nasty fossil fuels that muck up our environment. These homes also require more resources for building and create more waste as a result. So if you’re looking to incorporate green home design in your building plans, build small.

Green Home Design Rule 2: Incorporate Passive Solar Design

Passive solar cooling and heating is one of the most important elements of green home design. This kind of heating and cooling is relatively simple, and uses the climate to dictate the design of the home. In warm climates, design is used to reduce the amount of heat absorbed by the home. In cold climates, the amount of heat lost is reduced. Green home design uses the building’s orientation to the sun, window positioning, stone flooring, and other building elements to control the temperature and save energy.

Green Home Design Rule 3: Use Recyclable or Renewable Materials

Almost everything used in a traditional home harms the environment in some way, either by its manufacture (plastics and artificials) or its transport (naturals). The use of renewable or recycled materials which are manufactured locally helps to reduce the damage building can have on the environment. Use recycled materials, such as recycled insulation and lumber composites, or quickly-renewable products, such as bamboo flooring, in your green home design.

Rule 4 in Green Home Design: Shrink your AC

Heating and cooling a home accounts for the huge majority of its energy consumption. And even though the thought of the hot summer months might make an oversized air conditioning system sound pretty tempting, this kind of cooling is as anti-green home design as you can get. Large AC systems overcool the air, and tend to cycle on and off too frequently. This constant on-and-off cycle gives large AC systems a short lifespan, making them create extra waste along with using up extra fuel.

With the spirally costs of heating and cooling a home, building green homes that are energy efficient makes economic sense. It is estimated that a U.S. family that does not live in a green home spends nearly $1300 a year on home energy bills. By letting in light and air green homes reduce the cost of buying air conditioners or heaters. Harnessing the power of nature in a green home like solar power or wind power can help run most household consumer durables without the fear of a power outage. Naturally occurring stone and terra cotta bricks are eco friendly and do not have the harmful effects of chemically treated mass produced building material. A green home is a minimum wastage home and is built with recycled material like rubber floors made of car tires and recycled stone and metal from construction salvage yards and fly ash a by product of concrete factories. Link of interest

Unlike the conventional light bulb that turns light into heat compact fluorescent lamps convert the gas inside their glass casing into light and no unnecessary heat is generated to artificially alter the temperature in a green home. . When building a green home it is preferable that pastel shades or whitewash is used to color the walls to make greater use of natural sunlight. The cost involved in building a green home may be off putting for some but it is a small price to pay compared to the long term energy and maintenance savings benefits it provides. grandrss.com

Tags in this post: Green home, Building a green house

With great enthusiasm you have now decided to build your green home. So how do you go about it? Well, for starters there are some basic questions, which need to be asked when planning green home construction. The primary concern would be the planned location for your green house. Which green resources are indigenously on hand? To build your green house what are the suitable green designs? Who else is interested? Is there a suitable architect available? Is there ant help from the government? The solutions to these concerns will clarify the way forward for building your green home.

The designs required for construction of green homes will depend largely on the geographical location you choose. A green house design for a house by the seaside would differ from that in the mountains or the deserts or in the plains.

The green resources available locally will come next in your checklist for your green home construction. Your choice would have to be sensible, even though plentiful organic resources are available. For example, choosing to cut down those trees which are plentiful instead of the rare long living variety which are much more difficult to replace. Your green home construction could well aid national resource conservation by using products recycled from the city’s landfills.

The dictates of weather will also decide what sort of green design you would want to incorporate. For example, sloping traditional roofs with runnels would be appropriate in wet weather climate rather than flat topped log cabins, which are more suitable for the mountains. Straw bale and compressed earth blocks are more appropriate for ‘green’ home constructions in warmer regions.

A surefire success for green home construction … involve others. Remember, a community effort is always better than ‘going at it alone’. It helps you to conserve resources and save money. For example, if a community decides to build green homes they can pool in resources such as common swimming pool, common solar panel grid, common water harvesting projects and common recycling plants.

A ‘green’ home construction is not a province of the uninitiated. You would require a suitably qualified architect who knows the subject. The architect will know what to tap, what sort of initiatives will get you best tax benefits from the government and what will prove economical in the long run. That should be your mantra for constructing a green home.

The new in thing is building green I just want to share my thought on this topic a little bit. This is not a new concept. It’s just that nobody really cared about the topic too much back then. The motivation is really financial. The real big change is the cost of heating your house. This, along with the price of auto fuel has people in a different mind set.

I believe this to be a great step forward in the environmental movement. Without a business case, it’s much harder to get people to adopt environmentally friendly policies. I’m very much interested to watch how the financial changes impact this entire discussion. I would bet that building green, saving energy, and overall environmental awareness comes back into the mainstream discussion like it was in the 70’s. See more here.

The Main Points: Green home builders, Green home store

effortweb.com

What does it mean when people say that they are building a green home? There are several features that most green homes have include using the sun and land for natural heating and cooling, reduced construction waste, using sustainable resources, and/or using energy efficient appliances and fixtures. These features can be implemented in many ways both in building a green home and in updating an existing home.

So, how can you go about building a green home? There are really some very simple steps you can take to improve the home that you have now or to take into consideration when building a green home. One of the biggest things that you can do to promote greenness in your home is to update fixtures and appliances, especially those that use water.

An essential step to take is to update your toilet. Old toilets use much more water than updated ones and can be replaced relatively easily. It is also important to check your faucets in your home. Gallons of water can be wasted each day from leaky faucets and you may not even realize it! Additionally, and I do know that this is expensive, but top-loading washers use a lot more water than front loaders. Don’t run out and buy a new washer today, but do keep this in mind when you are in the market for one.

Another thing to keep in mind for either building a green home or updating an existing structure is the type of windows and insulation that you are using. When building a green home, energy efficient windows can really help cut heating costs, especially with fuel costs the way that they are. Additionally, proper insulation can help cut both heating and cooling costs.

While I understand that it is not always possible to go out and spend a lot of money on updates for your home, there are many things that you can do to that are very inexpensive. The cheapest, easiest update that I have done to make my own home more green is to purchase a water-saving showerhead. I only paid seven dollars for it, and it uses half of the water that my old showerhead did. Building a green home or updating and existing home is actually pretty simple and does not need to be expensive.

The Green Movement, popular with the Hippies in the early 60s was the precursor for the present interest in building Green homes. Thereafter, the Green movement evolved differently in the United States and Europe. In the 1970s, the Green Movement gained political credibility with the establishment of the Green Party in Germany. Many more Green political parties came into being notably in Europe and thus an institutional approach to the green movement was in place in Europe. Many of these Green parties formed part of coalition governments in Europe thus giving governmental support to green initiatives quite early on. The German government passed the green legislation tax, one of the first green initiatives in the world.

No such legislative activity took place in the States. In this country, the Green movement has continued its march without any federal support. During the early years, building green homes was significantly more expensive than normal homes. American construction companies, sans the governmental pressures faced by their European counterparts, sought only to augment their profits rather than build green.

Building Biology is a well recognized 30 year old movement in Europe, and the main argument forwarded by its proponents is that indigenously available materials are healthier than concrete, steel and plastic foam construction material. Consequently, over the years, Europeans have been building walls with the help of loam. Contributing to the conservation efforts is also possible by using recycled paper as insulation. Used bathing water which was till late considered as waste by Americans, can be sensibly utilized for landscaping. The LEED norms in vogue in the United States are not legal regulations yet. The European proposal to unify all green norms under the French green building norms is a pertinent move that the government would do well to seriously consider.

Houses in the US are usually constructed of wood which is both abundant and economical.\ However, the housing boom in the Untied States led to increased import of timber and thus saw a rapid denuding of tropical rainforest. The real estate developers did not see it fit to consider the incalculable harm that was being done to the global environment. In contrast, forest conservation has been a priority with the European nations and this has resulted in them shifting to using quick rowing wood such as bamboo for construction purposes. Little surprise as to the reason Europeans seem far ahead in structuring green homes as against Americans.

Green home building is very popular in the United States today, but many people do not know that Europeans have been building green homes for decades. We have many technologies that are just emerging in the United States that seem to be new and innovate…they are not. This phrase “green home building” is talked about in such a way that people are astonished by new technologies, but really, these technologies are only new to us.

In Europe, for example, there is a building material called Autoclave Aerated Concentrate, or AAC, which has been used in new construction for years. GreenHomeBuilding.com says that this substance is popular in Europe because it is completely fire proof, highly insulating, and very lightweight. This means that it can be easily transported in larger quantities, which will consume less fuel. Additionally, AAC is made of water, sand, cement, lime, and aluminum powder. Eighty percent of the AAC is made up of air, which is the main ingredient. The most important benefit is the fact that its production does not produce any byproducts. Builders have been using this building material in Germany for almost a century; however, it was introduced in the United States in 1996 and still is not widely accepted.

An additional green home building material that is used widely in Europe but not in the United States is the Wood Fiber Board. This type of board is created from the wood chip waste which is a byproduct of sawmills. GreenHomeBuilding.com explains the fact that these boards do not emit toxins when manufactured. They are very inexpensive to produce, and they are totally compostable. But, we do not use those very much here in the United States. We like to cut down new trees to make new boards. We do not like using what we already have to make something new.

Europe is way ahead of us when it comes to green home building practices. People in Europe have been using such construction methods for about a century, so it is nothing new for them…it is a way of life. We have a long way to go, but we are finally in the right frame of mind here in the United States to begin conserving resources… I just hope it is not too late.

Several aspects will impact a green home construction, and these need to be integrated in the primary plan of the building. In a green home, use of recyclable material is very important from the point of view of conservation. This could include using high fly ash content cement instead of normal cement. Salvage of reusable material from landfills, such as using reengineered wood or ancient wooden beams retrieved from old houses are other aspects of using recycled materials. It is best to incorporate the green features during the construction phase. This also involves installation of a drip irrigation system for landscaping instead of the usual sprinkler system. A rainwater harvesting plant is best effective when installed in the initial design stage. Pathways, drive ways should be made of permeable paving so that rainwater can seep through the soil.

Using Forest Stewardship Council (SFC) certified wood for all wooden fittings in the house is favorable to a green house construction. Even employing no/low formaldehyde based paints for the interiors of the house helps in creating healthier living conditions. Harnessing the power of the sun by fitting solar heaters and photovoltaic cells helps reduce electricity consumption and lower bills. It is better to fit light colored roofs than dark colored roofs because they are more reflective and thus reduce buildup of heat inside the house. Also, they last longer because since the heat absorbed is less, they do not expand thermally as much as dark colored roofs.

Green Home Construction holistically handles both fixed as well as movable items in a house. It is best to use recycled wood furniture for the house interiors. Garden furniture can be made out of recycled plastic, which is easily available in the market. A green initiative gaining popularity is using cork or bamboo flooring instead of the usual hardwood flooring. It is better to use natural linoleum rather than vinyl linoleum. Make sure that the ducting in the house is leak proof. It has been estimated that leaks in ducting cause a loss over 10% of the energy used. Fitting flow reducers to faucets and shower heads and low volume flushes helps reduce 40% consumption of water without anybody noticing the difference. Use on insulation which does not contain formaldehyde helps prevent sickness. One good material for insulation is cellulose insulation made out of recycled paper.

Double paned windows with low emission are very good green concepts. Double paned windows not only provide more insulation but also help make the house quieter. Insulation can further be enhanced using wooden frames for housing windows. The piping of the house should have a jacket to reduce loss of heat. These guidelines should come in handy if you are planning to build a green home.

Just a quick first post to say that hi. I will try hard to post each and every day here on my blog. My topic is green building and sustainable design. Please comment and come back when I have more. Thanks gain for stopping by.