Sustainable Houses are the future of humanity, since they reflect the desire of millions of people to have a home that is friendly and harmonious with the environment that surrounds them. If you want to know a little more about this interesting type of construction, we invite you to continue reading this article.
Sustainable Houses
A sustainable house is one that does not generate waste of any kind, but is also linked to saving energy and different resources in general. For this reason, to create an ecological home, you can use different means that help us save an amount of materials, such as the dry construction technique. In such a way that, if we look at the usual constructions, we see that there are different ways to give a house the possibility of maximizing energy savings.
For example, ensuring that the walls have more insulation than usual, in order to maintain optimal temperatures during the hottest and coldest months of the year, and that the carpentry is sufficiently airtight with double glazing for the same purpose. . With this combination and the addition of solar panels to produce hot water and heating, we can say that we have the basis for that house in the future to be beneficial for both electricity and gas consumption and avoid the unnecessary use of expensive materials. and they can easily run out.
Characteristics of Ecological Houses
To begin with, it can be mentioned that there are a large number of classes of these interesting houses depending on the material in which it is going to be built, as well as the energies that it mainly uses, or even the construction method, as some of the most popular are prefabricated houses. However, they must all have some common elements in order to classify them as ecological houses. Let's look at some of the common features of every sustainable home.
The first feature is a bioclimatic design. This means that the house is equipped to use the resources offered by the environment, such as the heat of the sun, to heat it. You also need to see the orientation of them to create air currents that ventilate and cool the rooms. Thanks to this, it is achieved: a greater thickness of insulation than in the houses to which we are accustomed; capture solar radiation to naturally heat our home; Also, create cross ventilation to cool the house.
As the last characteristic that any home that calls itself a sustainable house must have, it must have great respect and consideration for the environment. The best way to demonstrate it is through the use of natural resources, reused, or any that have a small ecological footprint. Thus, materials that require little energy in their production and transport will be used, and they must also not contain chemicals or toxins.
Passivhaus or Passive Sustainable Houses
It is a type of home that is designed to achieve the desired climatic conditions inside and achieves energy savings of around 80% compared to a traditional home. They are constructions that must have: optimal thermal insulation on the exterior walls, that is, that prevents the interior and exterior surface of the window from coming into contact with each other to eliminate heat loss; mechanical ventilation with heat recovery; and high performance windows and doors.
It is in recent times that it is gaining popularity, the truth is that it has its origin almost 30 years ago. In 1988, a Swiss-German collaboration designed this type of construction known as a passivhaus, which, translated from German, would be a passive house. However, at present, this expression is used as a name for any type of infrastructure, especially housing, that meets the requirements demanded by this concept.
Among the benefits of this type of sustainable housing, it can be said that they are not only excellent in terms of price but also in terms of health. Numerous studies guarantee the health of the inhabitants of this type of housing, since its intelligent air renewal, its presence of sunlight, as well as its construction with natural materials and less polluting than conventional ones, help prevent and reduce respiratory diseases and infections, for example: fibromyalgia or asthma, among others.
How to have Sustainable Houses?
If we want to go from a normal home to a sustainable one, the possibilities are real. The process can be expensive or not, depending on how much you want to do and the possibilities of each one. The good thing is that it is an investment that then has a return on normal expenses. Changing the openings, improving the insulation of the roof if it were flat or installing a false ceiling, are some of the things that can be done and, depending on the case, it is not necessary to rent an architecture studio. Still, here are some tips for making sustainable homes:
Environment-friendly paints: The first step to achieve all types of sustainable houses is the use of paints that do not leave an environmental footprint, that are made with materials that can be biodegradable. In addition, since they do not contain oil, lead, or toxic solvents, they are the best alternative for the care of your children and your pets. In turn, we recommend the use of nopal waterproofing as an alternative for your home.
Change taps: It is one of the most needed implements to obtain a home that falls within the classification of sustainable houses. Basically, it is required to change all the usual taps in a house, for some more favored by the environment. Of course, this will require an initial investment, but in the future, you will see that the bills for water consumption will be very low. Among the types of recommended faucets, we have: single-lever, timed, thermostatic and electronic.
Installation of solar panels: The best sustainable houses in the world have at their disposal a series of panels that take the energy emitted by the sun and transform it into electricity for the home. And not only that, these panels can also be used to take advantage of the heat of the sun itself and make the water heater or heating work. Of course, at present, it would represent one of the biggest expenses that anyone who wants to have an ecological house must make, however, over time the energy savings that you will have will have been worth it.
Use led bulbs: Another of the requirements that every house that is ecological requires is that the bulbs that are used are of the LED type. These have shown their enormous effectiveness unlike traditional ones: on the one hand, they emit a greater amount of light; You can also count on a longer lifespan as it consumes almost 89% less energy; in addition, it does not get too hot; and, finally, it can be mentioned that there are some that are biodegradable.
Using electrical equipment that does not consume a lot of energy: Today, a huge number of household appliances are being manufactured whose energy consumption is not as high as it was more than a decade ago. For this reason, it is recommended to all those people who want a home worthy of being classified as one of the sustainable houses, seek to replace all their appliances and electrical devices with those that have the label of being favored with the environment, usually represented in green and with a leaf.
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