Sustainable Home:

Environmental issues are becoming increasingly important and there is an associated increase in public awareness.  To formulate and assess the best way for creating a sustainable home the government begun a series of studies and prepared number of technical guides with the final one being published in April of 2008.

The assessment for a sustainable home covers nine categories of sustainable design, including:

Energy and CO2 Emissions

Water

Materials

Surface Water Run-off

Waste

Pollution

Health and Wellbeing

Management

Ecology.

{This is to acknowledge that part of the above material has been copied from “Communities and Local Government” as Crown copyright.}

From the above categories most or some can be adapted depending on the type of building, new build or a conversion.  In the case of a new build all the following products or systems can be used.

There are varieties of different materials which can be used, below we have described some of them, it all depends how green you wish your home or renovation project to be:

All Timber internal & external with wood shaving cavity

Structural Insulated Panel Systems (SIPs) offer a modern method of off-site construction where individual walls each SIP is engineered from 2 layers of OSB3 (timber from sustainable sources) filled in with insulation.

Environmental Blocks

Eco-masonry is a load-bearing block that is made of a composite of plant fibre and non-toxic cement.

Aircrete blocks: The block has exceptional thermal insulation qualities, which make it ideal for use in walls below ground  internal, separating and external walls

Clay Blocks; Whilst being ecologically sustainable they provide outstanding thermal and sound insulation,  Breathable healthy living environment, Economical effective, low life cycle costs meeting all building regulations.

Traditional Lime Mortar; Also known as Natural Lime Mortars, mortars of this type are made with sand and use lime as a binder.

Traditional Lime Mortar can be used where possible with all masonry type blocks.

Earth Building

Earth construction is the practice of building with unfired, untreated, raw earth. It has been successfully used around the world for over 11,000 years, and it is estimated that around half the world's population today live and work in earth buildings.

Types of Earth Building

The techniques and methods for earth construction vary with culture, climate and resources, but within the sustainable building movement, they can be categorised as: cob, rammed earth, wattle-and-daub, light straw, earth bags, earth bricks, and so on.