Green Building 101
How to build a house sustainably?
We all know that climate change is more real than ever, and surely we want to take our part to make it better.
We’re all doing our best – reducing, reusing, recycling… But what about our buildings?
Did you know that the buildings sector is the third largest source of emissions in Canada?
According to the government of Canada, 13% of Canada’s GreenHouse Gas emissions are coming from the buildings sector; 18% if we include electricity-related emissions.
Additionally, over 78% of building emissions come from space and water heating equipment.
That’s why to protect our environment and try to reduce the impacts of climate change, the Canadian government has committed to reducing the country’s total GHG emissions to 40-45% below 2005 levels by 2030.
Even more – we’re set to reach net-zero by 2050.
Surely, this will require significant changes. So how to build a green house?
Green building
You may have heard the term ‘green building’, but do you know what exactly comes into it?
Green building is a method of construction that is resource-efficient and is done in a way to have less impact on the environment and cost less to maintain. It covers all the construction aspects, starting with siting, design, and construction, to operation, maintenance, renovation and demolition.
Green building is also largely referred to as sustainable construction, high performance building, or green construction.
It is important to understand that green building is also not the same as natural building, for instance. Natural building refers to a sustainable building that only uses natural building materials – cob, rammed earth, cordwood, stone, timber framing and so on.
But going back to the green building – here are some main things that come into it.
So what are the main components of Green Construction?
Materials.
One of the main components of creating a sustainable building is using natural, renewable sources, or the ones that are obtained locally.
Some of the things to consider when choosing materials are embodied energy, durability, recycled content, waste minimization and the ability to reuse and recycle.
Water.
The next crucial element is water preservation.
There are multiple ways of improving drinking and wastewater efficiency, such as installing greywater and rainwater collection systems or using self-closing or spray traps.
Energy.
One of the most important parts of creating a green building is minimizing energy use. More than that, you have to make sure you’re doing this in all stages of the building's life cycle.
One of the ways to do that is to use ICF.
Want to learn more about ICF and different types of green construction? Read our blog posts to find out and follow us on social media to be the first to know!