2008 is Green Year, Check Out the Ultimate Green Home

A green home? For Electronic House’s Home of the Year? Yes and you bet. For the first time, our grand-prize winner is an energy-efficient, sustainable home that’s made largely from environmentally friendly materials. And yes, it has plenty of electronics. In fact, the home’s control system, lighting and shading systems help to save energy.

The contemporary 4,200-square-foot Casa Futura, as it is known, is powered in part by 26 solar panels, two of which provide heat for the home’s hot water needs. It has water-saving features such as low-flow, dual-flush toilets and smart irrigation systems that water plants only when they need it. The home is constructed largely of recycled materials, with concrete radiant-heated floors and an efficient metal roof. Walls contain extra blown-in insulation, and the windows reflect heat and harmful ultraviolet light. Motorized blinds automatically shade the large windows to keep the rooms cool, and natural ventilation reduces the need for air-conditioning. All the appliances are Energy Star–rated for better efficiency, from the front-loading clothes washer to the low-water dishwasher. Highly efficient and long-lasting LEDs (light-emitting diodes) are used in several rooms as accent lighting, complementing energy-saving compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs) and traditional incandescent bulbs on dimmers for energy savings. And a whole-house control system ties together the lights, shades, thermostats and other electronics into one easy-to-use system. The house is so efficient, it has achieved Gold-level LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design), the de facto green building rating system of the U.S. Green Building Council.

Read all about at ElectronicHouse [source]