Is a sustainable home more cost effective compared to an ordinary home?

Question

Best answer gets 10 points!

Answer 1

If by "sustainable" meaning...off the power grid and self reliant, for the most part, it may be possible...as long as you have your own water sourcs...like a well or something. But even the most self reliant homes need some sort of a sewage system.

You can take yourself off the eletrical grid, but then again, you kind of have to be familiar with the distribution and workings of the system since you won't be able to simply call up Edison and tell them you have a power outage. Solar systems cost alot, but some companies / cities are offering rebates for the conversion. Typically i've seen 10% of cost or so. Its expensive, but good thing is, if you have enough capacity, you won't be paying an electric bill.

Cooling and heating can for the most part be done by technological studies of the area you live. Some homes are built into the earth to take advantage of cooling, some use southern solar rooms to use the heat of the sun. The homes i've seen in various areas look a little funny, but they work for the most part.

If you have the land, you can grow your own garden to supplement food. It is a great undertaking, and you might not be completely self reliant, but can come close.

But it will cost, and its alot of work.

Answer 2

Many people shy from building sustainable buildings as their cost of construction is slightly higher than the cost of building conventionally. But the fact is that the incremental cost of constructing a green building gets paid back in 3-5 years.

The tangible benefits of going green --

    * A Green Building consumes 30-40% less water and 40-50% less energy as compared to a conventional building.

    * It enhanced productivity of occupants by 10-15%.

There are also some intangible benefits --

    * Enhanced health and safety of occupants

    * Enhanced occupant comfort

    * Imbibe best operational practices from day one

For more info, related articles and links, see http://www.copperwiki.org/index.php/Gree...