Arado weeHouse
Kim and I often have long debates about our future home and whether it is more environmentally friendly to build a new, green home, or update an existing home with green technology. It's fun to debate both sides, and we continue to come up with new arguments as to why one is better for the planet's well-being than the other.
Building new gives one the freedom to design the living space to fit your needs, use modern, durable, green building materials, and implement energy saving technologies from the ground up. If you truly want to maximize efficiency, I believe this is the way to go. If Kim and I were to build new, our minds have already been made that we would settle for nothing less (or more) than a prefabricated weeHouse (shown in picture above).
Updating an existing home, however, means you're not building on previously undeveloped land that otherwise could be converted into forest, prairie, savanna, or a park. To me, this is the most sensitive issue. You see new homes being built all around you all the time, at least I do living in DeKalb and Kane County. How often do you see homes being torn down to make way for prairie restorations? Agricultural fields are no longer producing crops in our area, they're producing homes. The only time I've witnessed a home demolition (in this case it was two homes) was in preparation for a McMansion in a Wheaton, IL subdivision that makes the Dover Castle look like a Happy Meal bag. The point is, once you build on a lot, that space becomes permanent building space, never to see the light of the sun again.
Updating an existing home does have its downsides. Although I am no home remodeling expert, I imagine green remodeling an existing home, especially a certain one that we've been eying that was built in the early 1900's, can be time-consuming, and costly. When you factor in replacing the windows, insulation, furnace, and appliances, you may, depending on the size of the home, ultimately use just as many resources as building from scratch.
Ultimately, I think updating an existing home is the greener route. Kim and I both enjoy challenging projects, and green remodeling provides an opportunity to breath new life into an existing building, and save open space from the pressure of development.
2 comments:
Thanks for posting on Augie Physics - that way I found your blog!
Regarding building new vs updating old, maybe you can be lucky like we were. We bought a place that had a 30-yr-old trailer on it that really had outlived it's usefulness. We got a new house without developing new land (and we didn't have to run utilities to boot!)
Those wee houses are pretty cool. Some are REALLY wee. Love all the glass.
Dr. Vogel,
Thanks for checking out my blog. You are officially my first commenter!
I agree that you had a lucky situation, and one that is sensitive to the environment. You really have the best of both words, a new house on an previously developed lot.
I hope to get out to the Quad Cities soon to see the Audubon exhibition at the Figgie Art Museum. They are displaying a collection of roughly 40 "Birds of America" prints that were purchased by one of the Deere family members.
Derek
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