Five years ago, my family purchased a ranch house in the country. There were no houses across the road, and at night, visibility beyond our front porch was zero. We were thrilled, having moved from the second-busiest street in our town, and loved to watch the night sky come alive.
Fast-forward to present day. There is now a subdivision directly across the road, each house built grander than the last, and three more very impressive houses all in a row next to it. Of course, all of these mailboxes went into our yard, since it’s a rural area, and our property value increased, but that’s beside the point, and definitely not why we moved to the country. Where did this new housing boom come from, and what is it doing to our environment?
Was it really so long ago that we lived in a world in which families squeezed into ranch houses, kids shared bedrooms and didn’t think anything about it (other than squabbles over cleaning and décor) and new homes were rare and usually part of a huge subdivision in which they all looked alike? Now it seems as though kids are building houses right out of college — even high school. Old houses on the market sit empty, while new homes go up faster and faster and sell for unbelievably high prices.
On average, the construction, maintenance and use of buildings are responsible for 40% of all the energy use in the U.S. With only 5% of the world’s population, the U.S. uses 25% of the world’s energy resources and contributes more than 25% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions.
Typical building construction, use, and demolition, as well as the manufacturing of building materials, contribute significantly to environmental problems. By building green, we can protect the natural world and even have a positive impact:
There are five principles of sustainable design in building what is considered to be an environmentally friendly or green house:
If you are considering building, or even renovating, think about the actions you take as far as materials and methods used to do the work. For example, active strategies use solar panels that turn the sun’s heat into energy, while passive strategies might include designing and orienting your house to minimize summer afternoon solar heat gain and optimize winter solar heat gain. If you live in the northern hemisphere, you would orient the long sides of the house to face south and north while creating roof overhangs and landscaping to shade the east, south and west sides of the house.
Situate your house to take advantage of prevailing breezes during the spring, summer and fall. This is not only valuable for cross-ventilation in the house, but also can make screened-in rooms and porches more comfortable.
Fortunately, with the spotlight finally shining on our environmental problems, there has been a dramatic increase in new green materials and products. Flooring made of bamboo plywood, cork planks, composite board and carpeting using co-polyester resin and recycled content is more readily available.
Photo from: One Earth Design