by Ashleigh Mattern, Postmedia Content Works
Photos: Getty Images
Before he started building “smart green” homes as the president of Vereco Homes, Ronn Lepage was a chartered accountant. He understands the importance of saving money.
“Maybe it’s part of our prairie culture, but we all like to save a few dollars!” he says.
Vereco helps people build homes that reduce energy consumption and minimize their impact on the environment, saving them money in the long run. Vereco always encourages clients to invest first in the choices that give them the biggest payback.
“Don’t spend any more money than you’re going to get back, so that your house doesn’t cost you extra in the end,” Lepage says.
There are a few key areas where a little bit of an investment up front can save you a lot of money down the road, and surprisingly, solar power isn’t necessarily one of them.
“For our clients the last thing they’ll look at is solar electricity,” Lepage says. “There are so many things they can do with the same dollars before they get to spending that $20,000 on solar panels. Those solar panels may only produce 6,000 kilowatt hours of energy a year, while that same amount in insulation will save me 30,000 kilowatt hours per year.”
Insulation, insulation, insulation
By far, when building a new home and looking to reduce your environmental and carbon footprint (and save money on energy costs), insulation is your best investment.
“The prairies are so cold, so a home should have somewhere between R36 and R44 in the walls if it’s heated by natural gas,” Lepage says. “If you’re heating with electrical heat, which is expensive, you can increase the amount of insulation to R56 to R64.”
Focus on your attic, basement floor, and walls. You want to cocoon your house in insulation. Solar panels are the sexy thing on the roof, Lepage says, but insulation is where you get the most bang for your buck.
Regina architect Layne Arthur specializes in highly energy efficient building design, and is in the process of building his own net zero home. He’s building a 14 to 16-inch cavity around the entire house to fill with insulation.
“I’m basically going to wrap this house in a big blanket of insulation,” Arthur says.
His will be the first in Regina to be Passive House certified (or Passivhaus – a European energy code out of Germany). Passive House certification is the equivalent of LEED Platinum. While he agrees with Lepage that proper insulation is the most important consideration, he is going to be installing solar panels because he’s trying to achieve a net zero home.
Smart design and construction
One of Arthur’s challenges was finding the right parcel of land. For passive solar design, you want your major windows in the house facing south, and smaller windows facing north.
“The site of the lot is really critical,” Arthur says. “If you’re going to design a passive house, an energy efficient home, it requires more effort in the design stage than a typical home would.”
Knowledge of the local climate is also an asset. It’s easy to see how a home built in Regina will be different than one built in California, but Arthur notes that one built in Regina is also different than one built in Edmonton. Local climate is an important piece to take into consideration.
“To put a whole big, glass wall in a Regina climate is a recipe for cold evenings and a lot of heat loss,” Arthur says.
The size of the house impacts its energy efficiency, too. Lepage says a compact design is the cheapest investment you can possibly make because it actually saves you money to build a smaller house.
Airtight construction is another key factor. In a bid to eliminate all the holes he possibly can, Arthur is going to build an air vapour barrier using plywood, instead of using the traditional poly vapour barrier, which he says inevitably is going to be punctured by the homeowners every time they put up a picture.
High efficiency appliances, windows, and doors
In addition to the super-insulated thermal barrier Arthur is installing around his entire home, he’ll also be using high energy performance windows and doors. He’s leaning toward triple pane or quadruple pane windows, which are not readily available in Regina.
“I really want to push local distributors and suppliers and even manufacturers in North America by showing them what can be achieved,” he says.
Details like light bulbs and shower heads are also worth considering: A low flow shower head can halve your water consumption and the energy it takes to heat that water. With the way low flow shower heads are designed today, you won’t notice the difference, but your water bill sure will.
Regarding LED lighting, Lepage says: “If you have one incandescent bulb in your house, inside or out, you’re wasting money.”
Always the pragmatist, Lepage won’t recommend you throw away a perfectly good large appliance just to buy a high efficiency one, but if you’re in the market, he definitely recommends investing in an ENERGY STAR® model.
All of these design, construction, and appliance standards may seem like a lot of work, but in the long run, these choices will save you money and result in an incredibly comfortable home.
“Thick walls reduce street noise; there are no drafts because they’re air tight; they’re safer because there are no combustible gasses inside; and most of them have better indoor air quality,” says Lepage.
Ashleigh Mattern is a writer for Postmedia Content Works, a custom content studio that creates, deploys and measures programs for brands.
