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Defining YOUR Sustainability Goals
There is no sacred guidebook or set of rules that govern how to renovate your home sustainably. Rather, examining your personal goals, objectives, and ambitions for improving your home should be the starting point for any major home renovation. Perhaps you want a home that can deliver the purest indoor air quality with a minimum of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) that could impact your health. Maybe your growing environmental awareness is pushing you to invest in energy efficiency upgrades or renewable energy technologies to lower your carbon footprint. Or perhaps you want to invest in the latest energy-efficient technologies and appliances to help reduce your monthly energy bills.
Your guiding priority for a significant home renovation could be health, wealth, or planet-focused. It is essential to understand that these priorities will differ from person to person. This short article will look at various home renovation strategies that are driven by these three aspects. We will offer a few ideas and suggestions for how homeowners can renovate their homes for improved healthfulness, lower energy and utility bills, or lower environmental impact.
Perhaps somewhat ironically, the more airtight building envelopes that lower our energy bills and make our homes more environmentally friendly might also be leading to a worsened interior environment. Fortunately, airtight building envelopes and other essential aspects of sustainable and energy-efficient construction don't necessarily have to lead to bad indoor air quality. For homeowners interested in improving their homes' health, here are a few of the leading renovation strategies focused on health and wellbeing.
Can Mechanical Ventilation Improve Your Home's Health?
If you are fortunate enough to have an energy-efficient building shell, mechanical ventilation is an essential part of supplying your home with a steady supply of fresh air without compromising on energy efficiency. Heat recovery ventilator (HRV) mechanical ventilation draws the stale air from inside your home and replaces it with fresh air from outside your home. During the winter, an HRV's heat exchange core transfers heat from the outgoing stale air stream to heat the incoming air stream so that you're not blowing cold air into your heated home. Energy recovery ventilators (ERVs) work similarly, but they can also regulate the humidity while giving you fresh air. You can read more about the difference between HRV and ERV technology here.
Sustainable Home Renovation Strategies for Lower Utility Bills
According to one recent analysis, the average American homeowner spends $111 for electricity, $72 for natural gas, $70 for water, $14 for garbage and recycling, $85 for cable, and $60 for internet each month. Those average utility bills add up to well over $400 each month, which is most likely a significant part of your paycheck. Do you feel that too much of your salary is going to pay your utility bills each month? If so, consider implementing home renovation strategies that focus on lowering these bills.
Fortunately, most of these "wealth-focused" renovation strategies also help improve your home's energy efficiency. Though they might require an initial upfront investment, the renovation strategies outlined below have relatively short payback periods to quickly help you start saving money. More expensive home renovations focused on lowering energy use are discussed in the next section on renovations for reducing your home's environmental impact.
Conduct an Energy Audit
Have an energy audit done by a qualified professional to find out where you stand. They can tell you how much insulation is in your walls, basement, and attic and what you can do to seal up all your leaks. This audit can give you a jumping-off point to plan your renovation and map out your end goals.
Insulate
Most homes are under-insulated. Levels of insulation vary greatly depending on when your home was built and your region. Use the results of your energy audit to prioritize where to start. With so many different types of insulation available, you'll want to refer to our handy insulation round-up article to guide you along the way.
Weatherstripping For Your Home
Weatherstripping kits will probably only cost you $15 to $20 at your local hardware store. However, by sealing air leaks around windows, doors, and other parts of your home, you can get rid of those uncomfortable drafts and quickly lower your heating and cooling bills.
Sustainable Home Renovation Strategies for Lowering your Home's Environmental Impact
Home renovation strategies can also focus on lowering your home's environmental impact. These strategies generally focus on two different areas:
- Improving the home's operational efficiency via renewable energies, and energy-efficient technologies, and building practices, and
- lowering the embodied energy footprint of the materials used in the renovation itself.
Why Invest in Renewable Energy?
Installing solar panels, wind turbines, or even a small household hydro plant can allow homeowners to drastically reduce and even eliminate the greenhouse gas emissions associated with operating their homes. A major renewable energy project will cost you a sizeable upfront investment. However, it will pay for itself over the lifespan of the project.
Who Should Consider a Passive House Retrofit?
The best way to lower your home's operational carbon footprint is by opting for a passive house retrofit and achieve EnerPHit certification. These in-depth renovations start with a rigorous assessment by an energy advisor to determine where your home is "leaking" energy. The upgrades themselves might focus on improving the airtightness of your home's building envelope, investing in high-efficiency windows and insulation, updating your HVAC equipment to a heat pump, among other strategies.
Building Materials
Shop high-performance building materials that are vetted for benefits to your health, your pocketbook, and the planet.
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Can Local Building Materials Reduce Your Footprint?
No matter what direction your renovation goes, you can always make an effort to find local building materials. Prioritizing local materials can help stimulate your local economy while also lowering the building project's embodied energy footprint. Check out this Rise guide for finding local building materials for your next renovation project!
Whatever your focus is, be it health, wealth, or planet, there are countless improvements you can make to have a more sustainable home. Where will you start?
Tobias Roberts
Tobias runs an agroecology farm and a natural building collective in the mountains of El Salvador. He specializes in earthen construction methods and uses permaculture design methods to integrate structures into the sustainability of the landscape.
