Sustainability Intro

Many people talk about sustainability, passive housing design, energy savings, and environmentally conscious solutions, but what does this really mean? Is it simply a marketing ploy to attract customers? Is sustainable housing really an achievable goal?

Sustainable development is indeed a real thing, but it’s important to know the basics to ensure you are spending your money on the items that will give you the greatest return on your investment and the most positive environmental impact

What is sustainable development?

Sustainable development is about finding a way to meet today’s needs without compromising our planet’s natural resources and depriving future generations. Sustainable development can be as complex as designing and building a new passive house, but it can also be as simple as making smart design or material choices that reduce energy loss from your home. If we can reduce how much energy is lost from a home, we can reduce how much energy is required to heat or cool the home, thus reducing our impact on the environment.

Sustainable development also means ensuring durability of the construction and using materials and products that have been produced in an environmentally conscious manner, in a location that isn’t excessively far from the build site. (Yes, this does mean that importing fancy tiles or windows from overseas is not sustainable because of the transportation costs and emissions.)

Is sustainable development affordable?

You may not be interested in importing materials for your home, but the question remains: is sustainable housing affordable? Of course, if we all had an infinite supply of funds and time, we could retrofit our homes or build new homes to have a 90% reduction in energy usage. Realistically, though, homeowners can still implement various aspects of sustainable housing design without breaking the bank.

How can you incorporate the principles of sustainable design?

When building a new home or doing renovations, it is possible to incorporate sustainable housing principles into the design, even if you aren’t building a house that is completely off the grid. Your consultant (whether they are an engineer or architect) should be able to design a home that has some of the following principles:

Wall assemblies with a high R-value (a measure of how well materials insulate) to prevent heat loss through the wall
Window design and selection to reduce energy and moisture movement through the window
Design of an effective air and vapour barrier for your home
Well thought-out window placement and overhangs to maximize heat gain in the winter while reducing heat gain during the summer
Efficient heating and cooling solutions that reduce the energy load and ensure proper airflow in the home
Redundancies in case one system fails—there must be a backup to protect the carefully designed home

What happens next?

Equally as important as having a good design is ensuring the design is effectively translated into a final product. During the construction phase of your project it is essential to ensure that the wall assemblies are built according to the design, that a tight air barrier is created, and that the other details carefully thought out by your sustainability consultant are properly built.

There are many ways to make your renovated or new home sustainable. With the right ideas and principles in mind—the sky’s the limit.

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