Building along green standards does not significantly increase the construction time or cost. There is no reason why not to build green since it may save money in the short term and is guaranteed to save money on a monthly basis once the building is done.
I wouldn’t say this is the case with most “green” building out there because they are still building along traditional methods and “adding green elements.” Of course in that model building green is an added expense above the “normal” building. And of course the green elements are the first to go when money gets tight because they are so clearly add-ons.
As true green builders we don’t do it that way. Our building can’t be segmented into normal building and green building. There is no either or.
Our style offers significant savings in some areas that we transfer into other areas. For example we save in wood costs since we don’t buy wood, period. We salvage it for free. Those savings are transfered to buying more (already cheap) salvaged insulation. The end result is a house with four times the insulation without any extra cost or compromise.
The same cost as normal building but four times the normal insulation! This then reduces monthly utility costs by four! It is powerful and simple. And we’ve not even mentioned that no trees were cut or insulation manufactured!
That is what normal builders don’t get because they are still stuck in the old way of building. The truth is that green building is smarter on all levels.
But it can only be done by completely redoing the building process. When we build we need to allot time for wood and insulation “harvesting”, we need to have carpenters who can work with odd shaped wood, we need to have non-traditional material sources etc.
To get four times the insulation at the same cost we have to completely rework the process from start to end. It can’t be simply tacked on to the job. It needs to BE the job.
