Green Products for your Home

There is a very positive trend in this country
right now. One can hardly pick up a newspaper
or magazine without reading about it. Turn
the television on and you see it. What is
that trend? Green building.

So how can you green your home? How can you get your arms around just what products are considered “green” when building your home?

The first place to start is with the land where your home will sit. As you are building, be sure to protect as many of the existing plants and trees that exist on the site. If you have the option with your building site, one of the best measures is to design your home with solar orientation in mind. This is not a feature that involves spaceships; it simply takes into consideration the effect of sunlight on heating and cooling your home.

A few other exterior considerations are rain gardens, using plants native to Michigan when landscaping, and controlling storm water runoff from your home site. A little planning up front can help you easily achieve all of these.

Moving indoors you cannot begin to contemplate energy efficiency without considering the “mechanicals” that will be used to heat and cool your home. Many forced air furnaces operate at above 90% efficiency. What that means is that for every $1.00 you spend on gas to heat your home, 90% of it will actually go towards heating your home. The other 10% will be lost in the operation of the furnace.

From a cooling standpoint, 13 SEER air conditioner condensers are now standard in the marketplace. This is up from a 10 SEER air conditioner. A higher SEER rating means greater efficiency and lower energy bills.

There are other approaches to heating and cooling your home that are being talked about with greater frequency. Geothermal energy, air source heat pumps and even solar panels are all concepts that might be the perfect fit for your home and budget.

What about hot water? On Demand or tankless water heaters are becoming more common. Be sure to consult your plumber about their usefulness when it comes to designing your home around your lifestyle.

What would a home be without fresh air? It would be stale. Today we build homes using better products and methods than those that came before us. Many homes today are simply “too tight”. They need to breathe and to do that you need mechanical ventilation. Talk to your heating expert about an energy recovery ventilator or heat recovery ventilator. You will be glad you did!

What kind of insulation should you use? Tough question, but without hesitation you must seal your home from air infiltration. For that there is no better product than foam insulation. However, there are other approaches that are cost effective and do a great job. You should really consider insulating your foundation walls and there are number of products out there that make it easy to do.

The movement of water through your home is another area to consider. Dual-flush or low-flow toilets are becoming more popular as are water saving faucets in bathrooms and kitchens. They perform great.

Enough about technology let’s talk fun!

Many hours are spent in the building process thinking about flooring. You can “green” your home with flooring made of cork, bamboo or even floors that come from the eucalyptus tree (lyptus wood). All are great products and are reasonably priced.

What about carpet? Polyester carpet (PET) is making a comeback. Natural fiber carpets include wool and jute carpet.

For lighting consider fluorescent lights. They are very energy efficient. You can also consider motion sensitive lights.

No energy efficiency conversation would be complete without mention of appliances that are ENERGY STAR® labeled.

How do you reduce the pollutants in your home? Start with Low VOC paint. That is paint that is low in “volatile organic compounds”. What other products let off potentially harmful gas? The plywood used to build your home and the cabinets that your dishes sit in. None of this is scary, but asking about it during the building process will help you understand how to manage the indoor air quality of your home.

Dreaming of building a home? Perhaps you are building now. Whatever products that you choose know that your home is a system of interrelated parts. Every product that you select for your home will affect its performance.

Build well. Build green. Don’t be afraid to ask questions. Build with confidence.

If you arrived at our blog from a source other than our website, please visit us at www.heartlandbuilders.com. Further, if you are considering building a home, please contact us. We would welcome the opportunity to be a part of your dream.

If you have any questions, please feel free to email me at rgkogel@comcast.net.