GOING GREEN
"Green" is the big trend in homes right now, but you're forgiven if you're still not sure exactly what that means. A home with solar panels, a composting toilet and energy-conserving, water-miser Energy Star appliances may sound like an easy call. What about a larger home with traditional heating and electrical systems that also has low-VOC (volatile organic compounds) paint, drapes and carpets that don't outgas? Or is building green as simple as building smaller?
Actually, any of the above would be a step in the right direction. Going green can mean anything from where and how you build a home to the appliances and materials you pick, to strategies for cutting water and energy waste.
It is possible to be a little bit green. Everything helps, even if you simply choose a floor of sustainable bamboo instead of Brazilian rain-forest cherry or a kitchen countertop of recycled glass tiles rather than marble or granite. Not only will you help the planet, but doing so often helps your own bottom line through lower energy bills and your home's potentially higher resale value. APS Home Inspection Service can help and advise you of ways to Go Green or we can refer someone to help you with the changes as you want to make them. This saves you on energy bills and adds value to you home and neighbor hood.
As Green as You Want to Be
The average household spends $1,500 a year on energy. A green-certified building, on the other hand, uses 32% less electricity, 26% less natural gas and 36% less total energy. As energy prices rise, so do the savings.
You can begin just about anywhere, big or small, and many improvements can be done without breaking your bank. You could, for example:
- Prevent pollution during construction;
- Maximize open space on your land;
- Collect rainwater for irrigation;
- Install renewable energy sources like a wind generator or solar panels;
- Cut energy use with insulation and a highly efficient furnace and appliances;
- Build storage for recyclables;
- Restore wildlife habitat;
- Build new while incorporating the walls, roof or floor of an older building;
- Buy products made of recycled materials; and
- Use certified (sustainable harvested) wood products.
You'll be happy to know that some of the best investments are also the easiest to implement. These four will give you the most return for the money spent:
- Replace incandescent light bulbs with compact fluorescent bulbs. They last seven or eight years and use less energy, saving about $100 per year in electricity. Cost: $2 and up.
- Install a timer on your lights and heating-and-cooling system so you can program your home to consume less energy when you're gone or sleeping. Cost: roughly $30.
- Put aerators on faucets to dramatically reduce water use. Find them at hardware stores for about $3 each.
- Caulk and weather-strip air leaks around windows, doors and other places where the wall is penetrated. Cost: Roughly $5 for a 10-ounce tube.
How to Get Your Green Home
For larger remodeling projects or for new-home construction, you'd ideally work with professionals experienced in green-home building. In this still-young industry, there is no national directory of green building programs or builders. But the National Association of Home Builders has certified 300 to 400 builders in green building practices. You can use the NAHB site to educate yourself and find a local home builders association that may steer you to local builders with a background in green building.
APS Home Inspection Service advises homeowners to begin by finding competent builders, then interview several to gauge their interest and experience in green building.
Talk to the builder about their experience level with green building, the types of projects they've done, the number of projects they've done. There are plenty of competent builders that haven't had the right client to push them into a green project. They might not have a lot of examples of green projects they've done but that doesn't mean they can't build that way.
Listed below are some great tips to follow:
- Check references. Ask builders for names of homeowners, architects and engineers they have worked with. Interview references about the quality of the builder's work, which green solutions were used, how well these worked, how receptive the builder was to them and whether the job site was well organized and tidy -- a clue to the overall safety, organization and management of waste and recycling.
- Ask about costs and schedules. Ask if a builder typically stays on budget and on schedule, two sources of client-builder conflict. Projects can run from zero to 20% over budget. Learn the amounts of cost overruns and what caused them. All in all, the Green Building Council figures most new green homes cost roughly the same as non-green homes, though going all-out can add 2% to 5% or more to your construction bill.
- Research a builder's communication style. A good builder spends time on pre-construction planning, forecasts upcoming decisions well ahead and communicates early, helping to contain costs while making a project greener. Your contribution is to have a detailed plan and stick to it. For example, after your foundation is poured, your project will screech to an expensive halt if you haven't already chosen a heating system. Your green options -- radiant-floor heat, for instance, or certain high-insulation foundations -- will be limited and you'll feel pressure to pick the quickest, not the most-economical, solution. Also, inefficiency on the work site runs up costs. The argument that green building is more expensive is more likely to be true if you are making decisions at the last minute. The more time one has in a project to make decisions, the more opportunities there are to build in green features, reduce costs or save waste.
Your green seal of approval
If you want to get a green stamp of approval for all your efforts -- which could pay you back down the road with a higher resale value -- you'll need to follow the guidelines or checklists from a national or local program.
There are dozens of these programs around the country usually run by homebuilders' associations or utility companies. All of them set goals for conservation in site planning, water, energy, indoor air quality and materials. For example, Built Green's checklist for new houses includes keeping 30% of a site's trees, preserving native vegetation and refraining from clearing or grading during wet weather.
In addition, the National Association of Home Builders has written green home-building guidelines and is working on a national green building standard, and the U.S. Green Building Council has launched its LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certification program, still in the pilot stage. It lets builders and homeowners get a house certified to one of four levels of environmental integrity. The standards are much like the checklists and guidelines at local and regional programs but LEED is tougher than most other programs, and it's alone in requiring an independent inspection. So far, just 145 homes -- most are on the East and West coasts -- have earned LEED certificates.
True, there's some extra effort and expense involved in going green, but people living in green homes say it's worthwhile: In a survey of green-home owners by the National Association of Home Builders and McGraw-Hill Construction, 85% said they were more satisfied with their green home than with previous, traditional houses. And of course, there's the monthly bonus of lower utility bills.
For more information on green building, check out the following:
- The Sustainable Buildings Industry Council (SBIC).
- Colorado Built Green lists state energy organizations that can lead you to green professionals in your state.
- Denver's American Institute of Architects committee on the environment offers a sustainable design resource that tells how to evaluate materials, process and home furnishings in every phase of construction for environmental effects.
- The (sixth edition) GreenSpec Directory lists some 2,000 green building products, screened by editors of Environmental Building News monthly newsletter. Download back issues for free from 1992 to the present.
- The Environmental Protection Agency's green building site.
