Green building, smart homes, and sustainable development are hot topics in the construction industry. All the eco-lingo can make your head spin. Cogdill Home Builders is here to help sort out all the confusion. Green building is an environmentally friendly way of building homes. There are a number of design techniques utilized by Cogdill to improve the quality of life in the home.  These features boost energy and water efficiency not only preserving our natural resources but keeping extra green in your wallet. There are five guidelines the National Association of Home Builders requires to be considered a “green” home:

• Energy Efficiency
• Water Efficiency
• Indoor Environment Quality
• Resource Efficiency
• Site Selection and Site Development

Green is not just a way of living it’s a way of thinking. Our homes have the biggest impact on our lives. They reflect who we are and how we live, basically one huge self-portrait. So, why should you go green? Let’s talk numbers. First, an energy efficient green home, on average, uses 20-30 percent less energy than traditional homes yielding significant savings on monthly utility bills.  The U.S Green Building Council (USGBC) also reports that a home’s green label adds a 9 percent price premium, which means your home has a higher resale value than its counterparts. About 23 percent of new homes in the US were green LEED-certified in 2013. That number is expected to reach 26-33 percent by 2016. Here is some food for thought courtesy of the Environmental Protection Agency:

• If just 1 percent of American homes replaced an older toilet with a new Water Sense labeled toilet, the country would save more than 38 million kilowatt-hours of electricity-enough electricity to power more than 43,000 households for one month.
• If one out of every 100 American homes were retrofitted with water-efficient fixtures, we could save about 100 million kilowatt hours (kWh) of electricity per year-avoiding 80,000 tons of greenhouse gas emissions. That is equivalent to removing nearly 15,000 automobiles from the road for one year!
• If 20 percent of U.S. homes used high-efficiency clothes washers, national energy savings could be 285 billion BTUs per day – enough to supply the energy needs of over one million homes.

Sustainability is not just something you say. It’s the choices you make about how you live life and the home is where we shape our fundamental habits. If your home is green you may be more inclined to recycle or compost and share these habits and ideas with neighbors. Preserving our environment is a war that will take as many people as possible. Cogdill Home Builders feature dozens of green building techniques and products which are included in our SMARTHOMES plans. Because our homes are custom built, your home can be constructed to contain any additional green features or products you desire. We are very conscious and concerned about the environment and the preservation of our natural resources and do our best to build in an environmentally friendly manner. Call Mike today.