reener G oing
at Home
Generally speaking, a home can be considered “green� when energy efficiency, water and resource conservation, sustainable or recycled products and indoor air quality considerations are incorporated into the process of building or remodeling it.
Green homes must take the home’s overall impact on the environment into account, and minimize that environmental impact.
Benefit of A Green Home
New construction and remodeling the “green� way means using methods and construction materials that have a minimal impact on the environment. Green homes use more materials from natural and recycled sources. A green home is healthier for its inhabitants and less wasteful and polluting of the land, water and air around it.
A green home also saves its owner operating costs but, according to the U.S. Green Building Council, the benefits go far beyond financial.
There are positive Environmental results from a green home... Enhances and protects ecosystems and biodiversity Improves air and water quality Reduces solid waste Conserves natural resources in addition to Personal Health & Community benefits: Improves air, thermal and acoustic environments Enhances occupant comfort and health Minimizes strain on local infrastructure Contributes to overall quality of life Overall, a win-win-win-win-win-win...
An Eco-makeover Whether you rent or own your home, sustainable home improvements can save you money as well as reduce your environmental impact. And as fuel bills increase it’s a good time to think about changes. Renting: Your landlord has to provide an Energy Performance Certificate with a new lease. This gives you an indication of likely running costs and helps your landlord identify energy-saving improvements. Moving : You will need to provide an Energy Performance Certificate when selling. A better rating could make your house more attractive to potential buyers. Buying: Carefully check the Energy Performance Certificate, and if you are buying a new home find out whether it has a good Code for Sustainable Homes rating. Some online estate agents specialise in greener homes. Have your home ‘diagnosed’: Consider giving your house an Energy Physical, to see how it fares on the Home Energy Rating System. Once you’ve identified problem areas, fixes can be relatively inexpensive. Whether it’s replacing windows or fixing insulation, most upgrades don’t require a major overhaul. Also, contact your local utility company and inquire about a “blower” test, which will pressurize your house and calculate how much air conditioning or heat is leaking out.
Consider Eco-friendly Furniture Forget ‘‘crunchy’’ furniture that looks like it was discovered in an old hippie commune from the 1960s. ‘‘Green’’ or sustainable furniture now has a level of style and sophistication we didn’t see three years ago when the eco-friendly design movement first gained momentum. Eco-friendly no longer has to mean furniture that looks like it was thrown together from the scrap pile. ‘‘Choosing something environmentally friendly doesn’t mean it has to be stark, uncomfortable or unusual in any way,’’ said Jackie Hirschhaut, vice president of public relations and marketing for the American Home Furnishings Alliance, the largest trade association representing the home furnishings industry. She cited the example of C.R. Laine, one of the first manufacturers to use repurposed plastic bottles in the soft fiberfill of the upholstery backs of well-designed sofas. The move toward eco-friendly or sustainable furniture is gaining momentum nationally. Other well-known companies like Copeland, Century and La-Z-Boy are joining the movement. So are fabric companies such as Schumacher, the Q Collection and O Echo Textiles. Hirschhaut’s trade association has been helping manufacturers through a process to help them make more green furniture and reduce their manufacturing’s environmental impact. ‘‘We have been seeing the eco-wave about three years,’’ she says. ‘‘The materials being used are not all revolutionary with the exception of soy-based foam.’’ The foam became a springboard for upholstery companies to use other green products such as natural fiber covers, sustainably harvested wood frames, recycled metal springs and nontoxic glues, she said.
Defining Green What Makes Furniture Sustainable? It contains low or no volatile organi compound (VOC) fumes in paint and finishes. Paints low in VOCs do not release harmful gases as much as conventional paints and contain fewer toxins. Ask for no or low VOC finishes.
It is made locally or in this country. Shipping from overseas increases the environmental footprint because of the fuel it takes to reach its destina- tion. Ask where the furniture was manufactured. Recycled or reclaimed materials are used, such as metal springs, plastic bottles, glass. Reclaimed wood can come from old furniture, old houses or logs that sank to river bottoms. Ask if anything is recycled or repurposed. Look for a Rediscovered Wood Certification label. What Makes Fabric Sustainable? It is made of natural organic or natural regenerative material. Linen is the easiest sustainable fabric to find. Cotton can be tricky; it can be one of the most polluting fabrics you can buy because of chemicals added. Be sure the company uses organic cotton.
Wood is certified, which means it is what it claims to be and has gone through an approval process. Sustainably harvested wood is cut to allow regeneration and ongoing supply. Bamboo regenerates quickly but can be tricky because some sources are clear-cutting forests. Ask for a sustainability statement from a group such as the Forestry Stewardship Council, which should be listed on a hang tag. Materials are natural, like organic jutetrim and webbing, soy-basedfoam, no chlorine down, cushions encased in bamboo and organic cotton ticking. Ask about origin of materials.
It is made locally or in this country, which is getting harder to find because of reduced domestic production. Ask where the fabric was manufactured.
Designing A Smart Garden Smart garden design takes a lot of the work out of gardening. If you plan it right, you can have a beautiful garden that lets you take weekends off. Truly low-maintenance gardens are carefully planned spaces. They are in scale with your property and with your expectations. They’re full of attractive plants that thrive in your climate without pampering. The flower beds are showy without being chaotic, and the lawn is a cool, carefully framed green picture, but it doesn’t gobble up your time, money or energy. When you get it right, a low-maintenance landscape makes gardening look easy.
“Designing from the top of your head may work, but it will most likely work better if you write it down and do a simple plan,” says Jack McKinnon, a garden coach in the San Francisco Bay area who helps clients design and plant their gardens. Having no plan at all is at the top of McKinnon’s list of common gardening mistakes.
Brian O’Neil, a garden designer in Norfolk, VA., helps his clients understand the spaces and conditions in their gardens and concentrate the plantings in areas that are easy to manage and take care of: In a low-maintenance garden, he doesn’t make the flower beds too big, and he groups plants according to their requirements for sun, shade and water. In the center of a rose garden, O’Neil placed a sculptural urn, raised on a pedestal. As he says, the urn will never outgrow its space; it doesn’t need weeding, watering or fertilizing, and it will not die if it is neglected. It looks perfect year-round, and every summer the garden’s owner plants it with easy annuals that spill over the edges and complement the colors in the rose garden.
Flowerpots of all kinds let you grow the flowers you love without committing yourself to the work of large flower beds, and they also let you bring a part of the garden onto a patio or porch, or up the stairs. Brian Kissinger, a garden designer in Paradise Valley, Ariz., likes to plant one spiky or leafy plant in each of a group of flowerpots, and cluster the pots together for a dramatic effect. Since he moved to Arizona from the Midwest, he has discovered a simpler style, partly in response to the rigors of the climate. “Scale back: Look at your garden on a smaller scale,” he suggests. “Plant the things you really appreciate -- you don’t have to plant everything. You can have a great look, a timeless look, if you plan it right, and if you limit yourself.”
Household Utilities Stastistic 18.5 15.0 11.6
10.9
9.5 Daily indoor per capita water use is 69.3 gallons. Here is how it breaks down:
3.8
Showers
By installing more efficient water fixtures and regularly checking for leaks, households can reduce water usage
Clothes Washers
Toilets
Leaks
Faucets
2.9
4.0 8.8
10.0
8.2
10.8
Annual Energy Use in a Home Heating and Cooling Lighting and Appliances Water Heating Refrigerator
Annual Hot Water Use in a Home 37%
Shower 26%
Clothes Washer 14% 12%
Dishwasher Bath
11%
Sinks
Air Leaks in a Home 34%
Floors, Walls and Ceilings 15%
Heating and Cooling Ducts
14%
Fireplace
13% 11%
Plumbing Penetrations Doors
10%
Windows 4%
Fans and Vents Electric Outlet
2%
Others
Energy Saving Home Improvements An often over-looked aspect of home ownership and renovations are the long-term benefits of energy saving improvements. Here are just a few of the benefits you get from implementing energy savings into your decisions as a homeowner. Saving Energy Saves Money - You can save thousands of dollars every year and lower your utility bills by 50%.
Saving Energy Helps You Live More Comfortably - You will make your home more comfortable for you and your family. Saving Energy Allows You to Be Healthier At Home - You will improve the indoor air quality of your home so it’s safer and healthier for you and your family. Saving Energy Helps The Environment - You will reduce pollution and environmental hazards by half. Saving natural resources and protecting the environment is the best gift you can give to your children.
Energy efficient improvements not only make your home more comfortable, they yield long-term financial rewards. Reduced operating costs more than make up for the higher price of energy efficient appliances and improvements over their lifetimes. Improvements will also qualify you for an energy efficiency mortgage, which allows lenders to use a higher-than-normal debtto-income ratio to calculate mortgage loan potential. In addition, your home will have a higher resale value.
Appliances Make A Big Difference Clothes Washer By choosing an ENERGY STAR (energystar. gov) qualified model, consumers can save over $400 on utility bills over the life of the washer. These models use 50% less energy and 40% less water. A horizontal-axis washer needs less water because the tub, itself, rotates. Dishwashers Qualified dishwashers are at least 25% more efficient than new conventional models and will save the average consumer $100 on utility bills over the dishwasher’s lifetime. Also, compared to washing dishes by hand with running water, using an ENERGY STAR qualified dishwasher will save nearly 5,000 gallons per year.
Toilets, Showers And Faucets These account for 60% of water usage in the home, according to the EPA. Replacing these items with more efficient models can save up to 11,000 gallons of water per year. Other Products A number of other items have earned the ENERGY STAR rating, including room air conditioners and compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFLs). Qualified CFLs use 66% less energy than a standard incandescent bulb and last up to ten times longer. Replacing a 100-watt incandescent with a 25-watt CFL can save you an average of $60 in energy costs over the life of the bulb and provides equivalent light output.
Refrigerator Models manufactured prior to 1993 can cost up to $125 a year to run, but operating a qualified ENERGY STAR refrigerator can save up to $55 annually.
5 ESSENTIAL THINGS TO KEEP IN MIND 1. Aim For A Tight Thermal Envelope. The goal is to minimize or eliminate completely, the leakage of conditioned air. 2. Thinking Solar Doesn’t Just Involve Solar Panels. Pay attention to where the sun streams into your house. Controlling the amount of light coming in can drastically affect your heating or cooling bills. 3. Consider Your Home’s Circulatory System. Evaluate the heating, ventilating and airconditioning systems and make sure they are running at peak efficiency.
4. Factor In Fluids. If it’s time to upgrade your washing machine, consider watersaving and energy-efficient front loaders. Apply that same water-consciousness when replacing faucets, toilets and water heaters. For the yard, think about sprinkler systems that automatically respond to weather conditions. 5. Power-Up. Always consider ENERGY STAR appliances, compact fluorescent light bulbs and flooring and paints with lowvolatility organic compounds. They’re less toxic and may leave you breathing easier.
Swap Out Those Nasty Cleaning Chemicals Spring is here. Time to open the windows, let that fresh air in and rejuvenate your cleaning rou- tine. This year make that deep-down clean as green as it can be. There are lots of options for eco-friendly cleaners that will help you do your part to keep dangerous chemicals out of the environment, both inside and outside your home.
Yes, the air inside your home can be polluted and, in fact, could actually be worse than the air outdoors. One contributor to poor air quality inside is chemical cleaners. Through residues left behind on floors and surfaces or fumes in the air, these chemicals can contaminate your home. Plus, research shows links between these chemicals and a number of health issues ranging from asthma and allergies to reproductive problems. And the problems don’t stop there. When we put those nasty chemicals down the drain, traces of them bypass the water treatment process, contaminating the environment.
Unfortunately, finding an eco-friendly cleaner requires a little work because cleaning companies are not required to list all the ingredients in their products. Even if they do, it’s easy to hide toxic secrets in their ingredients labeled ‘‘fragrance’’ or ‘‘scent.’’ Start with reading the label. Those companies that are truly using safer ingredients want you to know it. If the ingredient list is a bunch of chemicals you can’t pronounce, it’s probably not green. Next, look for the government’s ‘‘Design for the Environment’’ (DfE) logo. You can find it on hundreds of products, and it means the product only contains chemicals the Environmental Protection Agency believes are the safest in their class. Method and Clorox’s ‘‘Green Works’’ lines both carry the DfE logo.