How to Make Your Home Environmentally Friendly

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Having an environmentally friendly home is an asset in today’s market, as society becomes more conscious of their carbon footprint and impact on the world as a whole. Making a more eco-conscious dwelling will improve your return on investment and reduce your power, water, and heating bills.

There are many things you can do to make your house a more environmentally friendly place to live. Here are some steps you can take to creating your own eco-conscious dwelling.

Improve Your Insulation and Heating

There are many steps you can take toward improving both your heating and insulation, and bettering the latter will have a significant impact on the former. To improve your insulation, you need to find out what’s in your walls and attic. You can do so by turning off the power in various rooms, removing an outlet, and taking a look to assess the thickness and type of insulation. Look in different rooms to make sure that it’s consistent throughout the house. Then you can decide if it’s possible or worthwhile to update the insulation.

Next, you can either replace the windows and doors or take steps to draft-proof them. Consider filling in the spaces between floorboards. According to EZ Heat Zone, you can also take this opportunity to install radiant heating, which is one of the more energy efficient heating sources due to its even distribution.

Properly sealing your home will keep your improved heating in during the cooler months, and keep the hot air out during the warmer months. This is a significant undertaking, but will drastically improve the value of your home.

Plants and Green Walls

Not only do plants and green walls bring the outdoors in, but they also help improve the air quality in your home. Green plants, whether potted or mounted to the wall as a green wall, absorb carbon dioxide and input a steady stream of oxygen into your house. Green walls take this a step further, acting as a sound barrier and improving temperature control in your home.

You can make this a multi-functional environmentally friendly task by planting things that you can use in other areas of your home or reusing scraps. For example, saving lemon seeds will allow you to grow lemon plants. While they won’t bear fruit, the green leaves emit a nice citrusy scent while improving the air quality in your home. If you create a green wall, consider making it double as a herb garden, from which you can use the fresh herbs in your cooking.

Reduce Water Consumption

There are many ways you can reduce water consumption in your home. The easiest way is to turn the water off when it’s not being used. For example, when you brush your teeth, turn it off between rinses. This simple task can save hundreds of gallons of water each month. The next step would be to replace taps and toilets with a low flow equivalent.

Low flow toilets reduce the amount of water used while flushing, whereas low flow taps reduce the water pressure to let less water out while you’re in the shower. In addition to taking these steps, consider rethinking how you use water in the summer. Rather than constantly running a hose for a sprinkler or to water your yard, optimize your eavestroughs to collect rainwater and use that instead.

Lighting Changes

Consider making changes to your lighting habits and the tools you use. Swapping out old light bulbs for energy efficient lighting will make a significant impact on your energy consumption. If you have a bad habit of leaving lights on, try to change that and turn a light off when you’re not in a room. If you require a bit of night lighting, look at the automatic baseboard nightlights as an alternative to leaving an overhead light on all night.

There are lots of changes you can make to create an environmentally friendly home. By taking small steps and working hard to do better, you can make this world a better place.