Many of our readers, both on and offline ask a lot of questions about how to go about doing eco-friendly renovations. When we looked at online resources for do-it-yourself renovations a few weeks back, we highlighted The Green Home Guide, which is a great site for planning out ecologically-conscious home projects. But since this is a topic of such interest among our readers, we'd like to start our own on-going series here as well offering tips and tricks for making your renovations as green as possible. Today's topic? Paint.

Every renovation involves painting at some point. Whether you're doing a freshening coat, or building an addition to your home, at some point the walls are going to need some colour! That's why we want to start today with a look at how you can make this part of the reno earth-friendly.

Just to Clear the Air

When it comes to paint and the environment, the main consideration is the level of VOC's in the product. Volatile Organic Compounds are toxic fumes that leech out of the paint when you're working with it and afterwards. Many of these are thought to be carcinogens when exposure is prolonged. Obviously, the lower the level of VOC's in a paint, the better it is for both the earth... and your lungs. 

Paint companies have been making low and no-VOC paints for some time, but independent testers have found that each brand varies in the amount of smell they emit, regardless of labeling. 

One brand that has come up several times in our review of many comparative studies, however, is called Aura by Benjamin Moore.  So keep your eyes peeled for that one, available at any Benjamin Moore retailer. 

Other brands that have received top marks from independent testers are True Value Easy Care and Glidden Evermore. True Value is a US-only hardware store, but Glidden's should be available at any Color Your World location or ICI affiliate in North America.

What Goes Around...

While VOC's are the most common measure of a paint's ecological standing, another issue to consider is the life-cycle of the paint production process: the very system of creating paint (and disposing of it later) can be harmful to the environment in and of itself. 

One innovative company I have come across that tackles this issue is called Boomerang Recycled Paint.

Based out of Quebec, this company uses patented technologies to take unused, unwanted paint and mix it together to form completely recycled product for commercial or residential use. 

The color selection is more limited than most paint lines because of the challenges of combining multiple paint varieties into one can, but other than that, the paint is largely the same in finish and durability as any of the paints that go into it. And of course, you can rest easy in the knowledge that by using Boomerang, you're keeping toxic paints out of landfills, and that virtually no pollution was created to produce the product. Oh, and a a bonus, because of the savings of reusing discarded product, their prices are very competitive too!

You can visit their web site, linked above, to see if Boomerang serves your area.

Now the floor is yours: Are there any other Green-Painting tips that you'd like to share? If so, let us know in the comments, and we'll update the post with any additional tricks!

This afternoon, I had the pleasure of attending a tour of the Minto Eco-Home in Manotick  (about a 15 minute drive south of Ottawa, Ontario), a joint presentation by Minto's project director Serge Desjardins, Minto's manager of innovation and green solutions Robert Smith (that that title exists at all is a testament to the power of the green building movement), and Douglas Rowland from CMHC, whose EQuilibrium program  provided the grants that made this development possible (or at least viable.)

The home is called Inspiration and it is a project that Minto is using to test innovative construction and envelope techniques and materials to achieve a net zero energy building. The EQuilibrium program bills itself as "a national housing initiative ... that brings the private and public sectors together to develop healthy homes that produce as much energy as they consume on an annual basis." 

In other words, the CMHC uses this vehicle to promote and fund net zero builds across Canada. They will also coordinate and fund a metering initiative for one year after the home is sold to track how it performs under actual usage scenarios. (In other words, the first owner of this home will be a bit of a guinea pig - but that's a worthy tradeoff for living in a home that actually produces excess energy and sells it back to the hydro company at a profit!)

This building achieves net zero by employing a highly insulated building envelope (double wall construction with an R-Value of 40 and ceilings at R 60), triple-pane low-e argon filled windows, a solar HRV ventilation system, and a gaggle of roof-installed photovoltaic panels.

 

What does that all mean for you, the prospective homebuyer? Well, put simply, it means that the home is so well insulated in every way that it takes much less heat to warm in the winter, and much less AC to cool it in the summer.

Another neat feature of the home is its sophisticated green-plug-enabled electrical system, which will allow the homeowner to use special green outlets in any room for any items that do not need continuous power when no one is home. With this cool feature, you could, with the flick of a switch, turn off computers, cable boxes and that TV the kids left on downstairs before heading out, and thus avoid unnecessary energy consumption.

Perhaps the most interesting thing about the tour (aside from seeing the home itself) was the interesting discussion it promoted from the 10 or so guests who were present. As we were waiting for stragglers to arrive before heading into the house, a stimulating conversation about the strengths (and weaknesses) of LEED broke out. 

You can check out the above link for a thorough explanation, but basically, LEED is a special certification given to builders whose projects meet a stringent list of Green qualifications. If you are interested to know just how and for what LEED awards points, I have uploaded their checklist and published it here  for your viewing pleasure.

In any case, during this discussion, I mentioned the difficulties that many developers have expressed around trying to meet the certification in rural areas, a statement to which both Minto reps nodded in agreement: the Eco-home is in the middle of a giant field on the south end of the south end of Ottawa, so there were no LEED points to be had here for, say, convenient access to transit! 

Another attendee expressed some degree of pessimism around what he viewed as the trend of people in the construction industry jumping on the 'green bandwagon', to paraphrase, and he wondered if there was any real meat behind all the green potatoes being promoted. 

But Robert Smith from Minto (who is a certified LEED consultant) made a great point here that I agree with 100 percent: He replied that despite its problems and shortcomings, he believes LEED is still good for the industry because it allows builders to quantify their green initiatives in a meaningful way, and encourages them to consider new ways of doing business.

I think what Minto is doing here is a really great sign and I hope they continue with the program. While I think it is admirable and important that smaller developers like Dharma Developments here in Ottawa go out on a limb and innovate in the green building space despite the additional up-front costs associated with doing so, the reality is that the industry as a whole can't truly change until the big dogs like Minto (and Tamarack and Richcraft...) start using their relatively massive RND budgets to really drive innovation and progress in sustainable homebuilding.

As Serge explained to me, at the end of the day, market demand is simply impossible to ignore. You, the customers are asking for ecologically friendly dwellings and are willing to pay a higher up-front cost to purchase them, knowing that you will recoup the difference in energy savings relatively quickly, and Minto is not going to leave that money sitting on the table for smaller custom home builders and niche developers to take without a fight. 

There used to be a terribly vicious cycle that held true when it came to green construction: Builders didn't want to shell out extra cash to offer ecologically-friendly homes because they were afraid that competitors would just continue business-as-usual and steal away all the customers with their lower prices. 

At the same time, some consumers claimed to be environmentally conscious, but still made price their top concern when push came to shove. The end result was, for the longest time, a huge disincentive for builders to bother catering to the "green niche" at all. 

It's nice to finally see that cycle breaking and that "green niche" becoming the general home-buying population. 

How about you - Will you consider ecological factors when searching for your new home? Even if it costs more up-front? Let us know in the comments.