A green home is not good just for the health of the environment, it’s actually great for the health of its inhabitants as well.
However, unless you really have a clear idea regarding how to approach the construction of an environmentally sustainable home, it might seem like a daunting task.
The fact that you are thinking like a responsible human who cares about his/her planet is the most important step of them all and you have already taken it; as for the rest, go through the following four tips to clear some of your confusions.
How to Build an Eco-friendly House?
1. Hire a Professional Green Home Builder
The very first tip has to be about hiring a professional who knows how to design a green home, rather than just another contractor.
Sustainable 9 doesn’t just build custom homes that are eco-friendly, but they do so while putting the inhabitants of the house first.
All products used by the builder are free of toxins and completely eco-friendly, but even more importantly, they bring all that energy efficiency required for any green building, without sacrificing on any aspects of modern living that are important to us.
Once you have a professional green home builder assisting you, the rest of the process should go as smoothly as it possibly can, since it really is the one stop solution.
2. Window Planning
The placement, size and materials used by windows in any room are extremely important to raise the energy-efficiency of the house, so consider the following points even before the architectural plans have been laid out.
1. Windows should be planned in such a way to maximize the amount of sunlight entering the building, because that would reduce energy bills by reducing the need for artificial lighting and maybe even for heating/cooling.
2. Insulating the windows is just as important as stopping the sunlight from heating the rooms during the hot summer months, or preventing the cold air from entering the rooms during the winter season.
3. Roof Planning
There are many ways to keep your roof from turning the house into a furnace during the summer, which in turn would automatically spike the cooling energy bills. Some of the most effective and green solutions are as follows:
1. The best choice is to build a grass roof because the layer of soil and grass above will keep your home from getting too hot, even when during the extremely warm months.
2. Add a coat of heat reflective paint on the roof to keep it from absorbing heat and sending it down inside.
3. Lay heat reflective tiles on the roof and then add a coat of heat reflective paint over it.
4. Consider a Small Photovoltaic System
Nowadays, solar photovoltaic systems (PV) have become more affordable, and even more importantly, they are more efficient than before.
If you are building a house in an area with good sunlight all year round, consider installing a small photovoltaic system to put that renewable source of energy to work for you by significantly reducing your electricity bills.
Conclusion
As mentioned above, the best and the fastest solutions to build a green home today would only require hiring a green home builder, which is able to guide you through the every step of the process, but even without one, everything that we just discussed should be able to help you at least to make your home greener than the average US homes.
