Expanding Your Home? Top Tips To Make An Eco-Friendly Home Expansion Project
Expanding your home’s size during renovation can be an exciting process. You want to implement new building strategies and revamp outdated ones. However, with the increase in environmental problems, it is essential to design your home in an eco-friendly manner. You can begin by sourcing products such as low carbon concrete, , chemical-free paints, programmable thermostats and so on. Here are some tips to help you create a sustainable home.
Use Chemical-Free Paints
Repainting the walls and ceiling is one of the things to do during the home expansion project. However, be careful to select ones free from dangerous chemicals. Paints made using traditional methods release harmful volatile organic compounds (VOCs) into the air for years.
Paint has a distinctive odour that many people are acquainted with, but it is harmful to the respiratory system. It can also disrupt standard breathing patterns, induce nausea, and cause harm to the brain and other internal organs.
Therefore, it is essential to paint your new home with low or zero VOC paint. Although it will cost a few extra, it will protect your health and the environment and give you a better result.
Consider Renewable Energy
Using renewable energy is one of the numerous ways to create an eco-friendly home for comfortable living. The sun’s rays provide large amounts of clean energy through solar panels, which can reduce your reliance on the National Grid, cut your carbon footprint and save money on your energy bill. Wind turbines can offer similar benefits if placed in the right location.
Renovate Floor With Eco-Friendly Products
Renovating the floor is one of those places that may genuinely make a difference in the home’s overall appearance. There is also a significant need for environmentally friendly alternatives in today’s world. For instance, if properly fitted, reclaimed timber planks do not warp, making them a desirable option. Scaffold boards are simple to acquire and have a strong track record of performance on floors and walls.
There is also the option of using cork, a renewable material that can be gathered from the same tree for hundreds of years at a time. Three to five times more carbon is removed from the atmosphere by each cork tree that is harvested. In addition to being supple and springy, it possesses exceptional thermal and acoustic qualities.
Bamboo is another option, and it is famous for floors since it is long-lasting, resistant to moisture, regrows at a quicker rate than wood, and does not need the use of pesticides while it is being grown.
Additionally, use sustainable materials for the building process. For example, the cement and concrete industry is now experiencing advancements especially concerning sustainability. Always go for reliable suppliers like Hanson UK, which is committed to reducing its impact on the environment.
Install Quality Insulation
Poor insulation contributes to environmental insults because it increases energy consumption through heating systems. Research shows that 40% of all heat loss results from lousy insulation. However, you can fix this by using double-pane windows.
Quality insulation is essential for homes, especially during the winter. Save money on energy costs and lessen your impact on the environment with proper roof insulation. Investing in high-quality insulation and plasterboard helps keep your house comfortable year-round, regardless of the season, while reducing your power usage and carbon footprint.
Start by including double pane windows in your home expansion project. There are different types of such windows: air-filled, gas-filled, and silver-coated options. Each variety achieves superior thermal performance, retaining heat during the colder months and releasing it during the warmer ones.
Purchase Energy-Saving Appliances
Energy-efficient appliances are a must for every eco-friendly household. Start saving money and reduce your carbon footprint by purchasing energy-saving appliances, including dishwashers, freezers, refrigerators, ovens, and washing machines.
Additionally, consider switching to LED bulbs because artificial lighting contributes roughly 15% of typical household energy costs. Inefficient incandescent lights release 90% of the energy they consume as heat. LED bulbs use less energy and are more environmentally friendly than other artificial light sources.
Install Programmable Thermostats
Saving money on your utility bills is as easy as purchasing a programmable thermostat and setting it to cool or heat the house less when you’re away or asleep. In addition to saving money, reducing your use of fossil fuels and lowering your environmental impact, energy efficiency also has financial benefits.
Ordinary thermostats overwork your heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC)system, causing premature breakdowns and repair bills. Once you turn the thermostat up or down, your HVAC system has to work very hard to heat or cool the area. Reducing temperature variations during the day and night and reducing the need for HVAC maintenance are two significant benefits of using a programmable thermostat.
Space heating accounts for almost 60% of a typical home’s total energy usage. You can reduce energy consumption by as much as 35% with high-tech HVAC (heating, ventilation, air conditioning) controls. One degree reduction in temperature translates to a 10% overall energy savings; therefore, temperature control is essential.
Controls for your HVAC system allow for different temperature regulations of distinct zones or rooms, allowing you to heat the home at a more economical rate while avoiding overheating unneeded spaces. You can set up wireless systems with minimal effort and purchase them for a low price, meaning you can quickly manage your heating system better using cutting-edge technology like evaporative cooling.
Evaporative cooling is a popular method for keeping homes cool even in the harsh, soaring temperatures of summer while maintaining its status as one of the most affordable and natural cooling methods, it’s also support developers and homeowners who are looking for cleaner and greener way of living. For this type of control you’ll want a reliable contractor like RMS Heating and Cooling to ensure professional installation and quality customer service.
Improve natural lighting
Reduce your dependence on power by positioning windows in areas that receive the most natural light. This method will also provide you with a significant amount of naturally occurring glowing light and genuine warmth. In addition, make sure that the refrigerator is kept in a cold place, preferably somewhere that is not near the windows, the stove, or any other sources of heat. This method helps to make the most of the capability of the refrigerator and reduces the amount of money you spend on energy.
Avoid Major Construction
Before you start demolishing walls or even entire rooms, you should take a tour of your home to evaluate what you can save and put to other uses first. This tip is essential for the environment and for your wallet if you want to break down walls: there is probably a large quantity of material that can be reclaimed and put to another use.
Before deciding, consider everything from the light fixtures to the flooring, tiling, brickwork, cabinets, and moulding. If you are planning on replacing the chandelier in your dining room, rather than just throwing the old one away, give some thought to repurposing it in another part of your house.
