Act Green Blog

Archive for the ‘Designs & Structures’ Category

Green home is synonymous with healthy family. If you design your home green, then you have already ensured that your loved one are well guarded. With green home designs, you can be assured of a durable flooring that needs no remodeling for years. This saves money and harassment both. Green home designs should include the use of non-toxic paint and sealants as much as possible for cleaner air to breathe.

You can go for the lumber that is certified by the environmentalists as safe. When you think of building green home, the initial costs may be high but in the long run it saves money. You can utilize wind and sunlight to generate power in your green home. This reduces cost of electricity bills. The Gray water system is another green home design that recycles the use of water from one part of the household to the other. All these minimize your cost and make you happy.

Green home designs are incomplete without using eco-friendly products and appliances. It is really important to understand the reality and opt for green home designs without wasting more time. First and foremost, you should use lead-free paint for your walls. No design is complete without color, so make sure it is not poisonous.

Recycled materials are in great demand and suits green home designs to the core. Counter tops and other things made from recycled materials are in huge demand. This improves the look of your kitchen and toilet as well.

Home furniture plays the lead role in home design, so consider them for refinishing if not dilapidated. Besides, make sure that you use energy saving electrical appliances and gadgets. Dimmer switches and fluorescent lights uses less energy but still makes your home glow. Also consider on getting a bamboo and cork flooring, as they look gorgeous and are definitely green inclusions. These are some of the green home designs.

Green building is a phenomenon that aims at instilling environmental-friendly practices in contractors and others involved in construction of buildings. Some of these trends that have been adopted include: substituting cement with other materials that are less toxic. These include fly ash, rice hull, silica fume and slag. Just like cement these materials are durable but cause no adverse effects on the environment. Another trend is use of low or no volatile organic compounds paints that are a major air pollutant. An alternative is the latex-based paints.

Another trend is use of bamboo for making floors as opposed to the hardwoods. Bamboos are beautiful and grow very fast. Further still, builders can incorporate equipment used for harvesting and storing rain water in the buildings as this reduces demand on the country’ s water supply. Installing of solar panels is also a green building practice as it makes use of the sun-a natural resource.

The elements of green design includes: sustainable site design, water conservation and quality, energy and environment, indoor environmental quality, and the issue of materials and resources. When designing, one is supposed to choose sites such that they do not damage any parts that are critical to the ecosystem. This ensures that certain important parts of the landscape including water towers do not become unnecessarily endangered.

When planning for the structure, the designer should create a budget that allows for retention of low impact storm water and include in the design features which will make it possible to achieve this. Solar energy is quite an effective resource if only one could work in features that help them capture the passive potential of this source. Maximization of the day’s light and making it well ventilated makes for a well designed structure. Engineer designed stress building materials make for an efficiently safe structure.