Essential Products for Eco-Friendly Home Building

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Whether you have purchased a plot of land to build your eco-friendly home from the ground up or you
are looking to tackle some upgrades on your existing structure (but reduce your carbon footprint in the
process), there are an amazing number of products on the market to help you meet all of your goals.
Okay, I know what you’re thinking; you’re going to end up with a concrete hobbit-hole of a home or
else it will look like it was cobbled together, shanty style, from whatever particle board castoffs you can
find in the “recycled” section of the lumber yard. Oh, and you’ll spend considerably more for this ill-
designed domicile. Right? Well, decades ago you may have been correct in these assumptions. But
thanks to the increased consumer demand for all things green, plenty of building manufacturers have
seen fit to offer products and services that are not only eco-friendly, but also attractive and affordable.
Here are a few that you may want to check out.

If you’re taking a ground-up approach, the obvious place to start is at ground level. While most people
are familiar with concrete foundations, few have heard about insulated concrete forms (ICFs), which
can be used in place of a wooden framework. They are strong and durable and they have insulating
properties, which make them a great option for areas that suffer severe weather (hot or cold). They are
also resistant to many environmental dangers that can adversely affect wooden structures, such as fire,
flood, mold, and termites. They are also fairly affordable and so much greener than deforestation.

And when it comes to fleshing out the walls of your home, consider structural insulated panels (SIPs).
Their price is comparable to wood, but they come with a whole host of eco-friendly properties. The
insulating foam core is faced on either side by oriented strand board, a compressed wood product
that uses every part of the tree and can be made from fast-growing or young trees (making it more
sustainable than, say, harder woods). Then finish off the walls with EcoRock (incredibly green drywall)
on the inside and eco-friendly (non-vinyl) siding on the outside. As for roofing materials, you are
probably going to spend a bit more here for the environmental value since clay tiles are a lot more eco-
friendly than, say, low-cost asphalt. However, they will better insulate your home, they’re fire resistant,
and they can last more than 50 years, which makes them a pretty good buy.

So, now that you’ve got the basic home in place, it’s time to attend to the interior spaces, and you’re
going to want options for energy and water. Depending on where you live you may have access to
alternative forms of energy like solar, wind, water, or even geothermal. Often you can use these to
meet both your electrical and heating needs (and even sell clean energy back to the power grid). And
consider an open floor plan to let plenty of natural light in. As for water, think about installing a cistern
to collect rainwater, install low-flow toilets, aerated faucets, and a tankless water heater, and use
recycled water on the lawn (landscaped with drought-resistant native plants).

Evan Fischer is a contributing writer for Morrison Hershfield, the leader in innovative, eco-friendly and
cost effective engineering projects.