More people are greening their homes to not only save money on electricity costs (and to be load shedding prepared), but also to reduce their impact on the environment around them. An eco-friendly approach to building a new property or doing renovations can however, be a costly exercise. But can we put a price on conserving the environment for future generations, especially your own family? While it might be an initial investment to green your home, making use of sustainable building materials comes with many benefits for you, the homeowner, and environment alike.
Here are some of the considerations to look into when greening your home with sustainable building products:
There are various factors that influence the classification of sustainable building materials.
With so many providers joining the green movement, you need to be careful and clued up on what exactly sustainable building materials entail before you commit to a purchase. A paper by the University of Michigan on sustainable architecture examines the qualities, uses and types of sustainable building materials available. The paper lists the following considerations when classifying something as a sustainable building material:
-
Pollution-prevention measures in manufacturing
-
Waste-reduction measures in manufacturing
-
Recycled content
-
Embodied energy reduction
-
Use of natural materials
-
Use of local materials
-
Energy efficiency
-
Water treatment and conservation
-
Use of non-toxic or less-toxic materials
-
Renewable energy systems
-
Longer lifespan
-
Reusability
-
Recyclability
-
Biodegradability
Now that we know what sustainable building materials need to take into consideration, here are examples of how to incorporate them in your home:
There are many ways to bring in sustainable building materials into your home, but a lot of people aren’t sure where to start. With some shopping around and creative thinking behind building projects, you can truly make a difference in how your purchase affects the environment. For instance, if you want to build a deck around your pool area, you can opt for recycled wood materials instead of buying newly-sourced wood panels. Steel is also a recyclable material, so ensure you source this as a constructing element. When insulating your home, look for products that have been certified as eco-friendly. Not only are you purchasing a green product, you’re eliminating the need to use electricity for heating and cooling purposes too. When giving your home a fresh lick of paint, there are various manufacturers in South Africa that offer eco-friendly paints with a reduced amount of harmful chemicals. Greening doesn’t just relate to actual building materials, but also the products you use in your home and their effect on the environment. You can help to decrease your carbon footprint by opting for natural and sustainably manufactured cleaning products.
Your choice of window treatment is a big part of greening your home effectively.
Glass is one of the most used building materials in any home and often makes up a large portion of the actual structure. Glass in itself is a recyclable material, but there are ways to further utilise the windows in your home to make them part of your efforts to include sustainable building materials in your home. Window decals are the perfect combination of an eco-friendly and energy-efficient window treatment. Glass used in windows and doors is known for wasting a lot of energy in the home, but window decals not only filter out harmful UV rays, yet still allow 93% of natural light. Window vinyl helps to save energy by insulating a home during the cold winter and then keeping the interior cool during the hot summer months. This means there’s no need to fork out on air conditioning or heaters.
Window Art is an environmentally conscious provider of window vinyl for both home and commercial purposes. We strive to offer the best tailor-made solutions to meet your budgetary and environmental needs.
