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Green Home Designs – Express Your Inner Green Thumb

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The biggest trend today is the green home design. Why? Living in a home that has a smaller impact on the environment and the Earth is great for everyone involved. The materials used to create a environmentally friendly house are often recycled from other buildings, last longer than traditional materials and reduce the cost of electric and heating bills over the life of the residence.

Renting Vs Buying Eco-Friendly Spots

Eco-friendly designs are exciting for builders to create, but that does not mean the owner is always the one living in the eco-friendly structure. Finding an environmentally friendly home to rent can be a difficult process because everyone wants to live in a home that makes they feel just a bit better about their part in saving the Earth.

As is the case in any business, there are owners who will place some Energy Star appliances in a home and swear the home is a green home design. This is not the case. Energy Star appliances do decrease the carbon footprint the home has on the Earth, but that does not make the home a green home.

An Altered Building Process

One aspect of building a greener residence that owners forget, is the energy expenditure used in building. The builder needs to agree to use more energy efficient building methods during construction. Hiring a professional green builder could mean working with someone who understands the need to decrease energy use during the build.

For the homeowner or investor who wants to do their part to reduce carbon emissions, energy use and the impact the house has on the environment, home designs with Mother Earth in mind are the best solution.

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The Importance of a Green Home Design

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When you create a green home design, you are contributing to preserving our planet’s natural resources. In addition, you are helping to eliminate greenhouse gases, which are the main cause of global warming. Besides improving the health of the planet, you can enjoy savings on your energy bills. This can be done by purchasing appliances that are energy efficient, selecting eco-friendly building materials and practicing energy saving measures.

Using recycled materials are the best way to achieve a green home design. Your builder, local home improvement store, or interior design websites have a wealth of information about instituting eco-friendly materials in every room of your house. For example, in the kitchen and bath, recycled counter tops made with paper stone are gaining in popularity over those made from granite.

The quickest road to a green home design is the use of energy efficient appliances, such as refrigerators, stoves, washers, dryers, televisions, air conditioners and small electrical items. Whenever purchasing small and large appliances, buy those with the Energy Star label. The seal of approval issued by the U.S. Department of Energy and the Department of Environmental Protection Agency means the appliance prevents global warming by reducing energy consumption.

A green home design extends to a home’s contents. One major area is the furniture, such as sofas, chairs, bureaus, tables and desks. Rather than buy new furnishings when they are outdated or when you redesign a room, consider whether the piece can be repainted, refinished, restained, or dressed in a slipcover. For worn out furniture pieces, determine whether it can be reupholstered or recycled.

There are various kinds of flooring that go hand in hand with a green home design. Cork and bamboo are two effective green offerings that provide additional benefits than traditional hard wood flooring. They come in a variety of color and style options, perform well in high traffic areas and look great.

A green home design should include dimmer switches. They can be easily installed in new homes under construction, as well as in existing homes. This simple switch can minimize energy consumption, which is a good thing for our planet. It can also put extra money in your pocket since you’re saving on energy use. That translates into a lower electric bill.

Complementing a green home design are other environmentally friendly measures that save our resources. They are the four Rs: recycling, reusing items in other ways instead of discarding them, restoring instead of buying new and reducing waste. Evaluate your home practices to see how you can enhance your go green pledge.

A green home design helps to preserve our natural resources and keeps our planet healthy. Going green doesn’t cost anything extra, especially when you consider the cost savings in the long run. Lighting changes, for example, instantly pays for itself. When you replace standard incandescent light bulbs with energy efficient luminescent ones, you conserve energy and realize a significant savings on your electric bill.

 

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Five Principles of Green Home Design

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A green home minimizes the negative impact on its environment through its home design. Here are a few considerations an architect takes into account when designing a green home:

1. Site: Evaluations and analysis of access, slope, ledge, soil, bodies of water, and vegetation in order to limit the home's impact on the site environment. This includes the site location (farmland, wetland, protected species habitats) and proximity to public transportation, parks, schools, and stores.

2. Size: A green home is efficiently designed to keep the square footage to a minimum. This reduces the amount of energy to heat and cool the home, lighting, and the quantity of building materials used, and also controls costs and reduces site impact.

3. Solar: Whether or not there is a plan to install a solar energy system to heat the water or produce electricity, there are several other solar considerations in green home design. Designing the home for passive solar makes the most of solar energy by harvesting it into the homes' natural energy flows. Passive solar systems include day-lighting strategies, heating and cooling control techniques, and natural ventilation. When a whole-building approach is taken, energy savings can be great both in terms of reducing the home's carbon footprint and the costs associated with heating, cooling, and maintaining the home.

4. Energy: Lighting, heating, and cooling systems are an important consideration in green home design. Renewable energy systems such as solar, wind, and geothermal systems use the earth's natural energy to heat and cool the home, as well as provide electricity to run appliances and technology..

5. Water Conservation: Building a new home presents a unique opportunity to save water. Two money and energy-saving strategies which can be easily incorporated into an energy efficient home design are 1) reducing the overall water using in the home by specifying low-flow water fixtures, low-flush or composting toilets, installing aerators on all taps, and installing low-flow showerhead nozzles; and 2) specifying a plumbing system that reuses grey water (wastewater from domestic usage such as dish washing, laundry and bathing) for flushing toilets, watering lawns, etc. (note: some grey water systems require approval by most local building jurisdictions, your architect will verify this prior to design).

Of course, a new home should use minimal amounts of fossil fuels, last a long time, and cost less money. Many home design strategies don't cost a dime in materials but can save hundreds of dollars on heating and cooling costs. The result is a beautiful, healthy home – for both the homeowners and the environment.

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Green Homes – Top 10 Benefits

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green homeGreen building is so much more than saving energy or reducing a home’s environmental footprint. Homeowners of a certified Green Home can realize many more benefits as described below.

Lower Operating Costs – Your Green Home will have lower energy and water bills as a result of energy and water efficiency measures.

Healthier Home – With improved indoor air quality, less harmful off gases and prevention of water intrusion, which can create mold, your family should be healthier, miss less work and school, which hopefully will result in less medical bills

Reduced Maintenance & Replacement Costs – Increased useful life of products and materials will result in cost savings. A properly planned landscaping package will reduce the amount of time spent working in the yard and allow more time to enjoy the outdoors.

Potential Financial Incentives – As green home building has become more mainstream, there are increasingly more federal tax credit and local government and utility company incentive rebates available, lower cost Green mortgages available and more recently, insurance companies are beginning to offer lower premium options.

Higher Performing & Durable Home – You will benefit immensely from a better built and higher performing home; 3rd party verification of duct leaks and house air leaks will insure that any deficiencies discovered can be addressed and repaired during construction, saving untold amount of wasted energy; certification experts will approve your home for your LEED (Leader in Energy & Environmental Design), NAHB (National Association of Home Builders) or other local approved Green certification programs, resulting in a higher valued home.

Environmental Friendly & Sustainable Measures – Can one family building a Green Home solve global warming or bring a complete halt to diminishing resources? No. Can one family building a Green Home contribute to the solution and be part of a movement that one day may be the new standard? YES! Through the use of sustainable practices, recycled and renewable products, and more energy efficient systems, we can reduce the impact on our environment and precious resources.

Higher Value & Resale Advantages – Your certified Green Home will have a higher value than a comparable standard home and if you decide to sell your home, multiple listing systems used by Realtors to sell homes are now recognizing green certification programs and it is much easier to market the benefits of home to buyers.

More Comfortable Home Environment – Imagine the personal benefits to you and your family by living in a quiet, clean, safe, secure and controlled indoor air quality home – is there anything more important that the health and welfare of your family? Is there really a price tag you can assign to the benefit of building a Green Home to you, your children and your grandchildren?

Safer & More Secure – Your family is better protected with the use of high performance smoke detectors, carbon monoxide detectors, radon testing detectors and security system.

Promotes an EcoGreen Luxury Lifestyle - Now that you have decided to build a high performance and healthy Green Home, your life is changed forever – all for the better! Would you furnish your new home with anything other than safe, healthy, organic and eco-friendly products? Might you consider living a healthier lifestyle? Will you sleep in peace knowing you have provided your family a safe, clean, healthy living environment?

As you can see, there are so many more benefits in owning a Green Home than just “energy efficiency” or being “eco-friendly”.

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Energy Proofing Your Windows

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When we think of Energy Star compliant we tend to think of appliances such as televisions, computers, dishwashers, refrigerators, etc and the amount of energy associated with their use, but seldom do people realize that the Energy Star compliant also applies to your home, more specifically, your windows.

The EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) broadened their criteria to include energy efficiency for residential homes and commercial buildings one of the criteria for judging a home for how efficiently it uses its energy is to test its windows for any energy leaks.

The reason why particular attention is directed toward the windows is because it is estimated that around 30% of the home’s total energy is lost because of them, while at the same time being responsible for as much as 25% of your heating or air conditioning bill due to the air these inefficient windows allow to leak in and out. This means that your home is much cooler in winter than it should be and much hotter in summer, especially with the way older windows are designed, this is because homes greater than 14 years weren’t built with a green perspective in mind. Around half of all the homes in the US alone were built with single paned glass windows which is responsible for energy losses.

Fortunately with developing technology and a green, sustainable picture in mind has seen the advancement of design where windows are now twice as energy efficient than compared to 25 years ago. With reduction of lost energy come smaller utility bills. With older windows because hot and cold air is constantly being lost the more energy must be expended in order to counteract this loss, resulting in higher energy bills.

Window proofing for leaks can help you save money on your heating while making use of the existing energy within the home meaning you use less energy without sacrificing creature comforts or without having to make any real major changes to your lifestyle.

Budget is a big factor when it comes to replacing your windows with more energy efficient ones which can set you back around $15,000, a home energy audit is always highly recommended to test if completely replacing your windows is the best solution compared with less costly alternatives such as replacement inserts rather than replacing the entire window.

There are several benefits to energy proofing your windows:

Less money spent on heating and cooling due to your windows ability to better facilitate the existing energy more efficiently.
Enhanced comfort and living standards with a warm, dry living environment.

Improved health and reduced illness due to proper heating and the reduction of condensation and the dangerous fungal molds usually associated with damp living conditions.

http://www.dsf.health.state.pa.us/health/cwp/view.asp?a=171&q=231318

Less carbon emissions due to the reduced need to consume more energy and the less impact on the environment associated with that energy production.

Better use of natural light.

Reduced noise pollution from the double glaze insulated design.

Receive an Energy Star tax credit through energy efficient windows. You may be eligible for a tax credit of up to 30% of the cost of your windows, up to $1,5002. What better incentive than to be rewarded for your green efforts. However, you must check for eligibility as not all windows carrying the Energy Star logo qualify for this rebate.

http://www.energystar.gov/index.cfm?c=windows_doors.pr_taxcredits

Here are some tips to energy proof your windows:

Double pained windows contain an insulating layer of air between the two pains which reduces the amount of heat lost and gained.
Triple glazed on the other hand has two insulating air layers separated by three layers of glass which makes this one of the most efficient designs around not only with its obvious energy savings but its reduction in noise pollution.

Those living in cooler climates are now starting to use energy efficient windows containing low emissivity coatings on the glass preventing additional heat loss.

Energy efficient windows are a lifestyle choice with big rewards as the savings in energy bills over a lifetime add up nicely to a small fortune.

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