Green Building

The home building industry coined the phrase green building in the late 1980s, turning a niche movement of resource-efficient homes into a quiet revolution – one that is increasingly becoming a preferred way to build and remodel.

Green building means incorporating environmental considerations and resource efficiency into every step of the home building and land development process to minimize environmental impact. It’s a practical response to a variety of issues that affect all of us – increasing energy prices, waning water resources and changing weather patterns.

It means making intentional decisions about: energy efficiency improvements; resource conservation; indoor environmental quality; site design planning; homeowner education; and, green business practices that adopt ideas from other industries.

The first official green home building program began in 1991 in Austin, Texas. The movement has grown slowly but surely since then and today, new homes are significantly more energy and resource efficient than they were even 20 years ago. A past survey of NAHB members showed that more than two-thirds are incorporating at least some of these green features into the homes they build, and that as the home building industry begins to revive, it will be significantly greener. With the 2009 ANSI approval of the ICC 700 National Green Building Standard, builders, remodelers, and homebuyers now have a clear definition of green residential construction and a credible certification to that standard by a qualified third party.

To see how homes become green, click here.

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Links

Green Built Texas - www.greenbuilttexas.org
ENERGY STAR - www.energystar.gov
Austin Energy - www.austinenergy.com