Elliot Springs Newsletter Winter 2021

Sustainable building design pays dividends Elliot Springs residents, John and Alison Ready, designed their home with the future in mind, with sustainable design features that ensure their home will allow them to age in place and help them achieve both economic and environmental objectives. What sustainable features have you included in your home? We looked at things like orientation of the block and decided on a block with an elevation to capitalise on breezes and views. Our block faces almost south-east to north-west and we’ve been able to design our main living areas away from the afternoon sun and our indoor/ outdoor areas take advantage of optimal shade and crossflow ventilation. We used eco-friendly building materials where we could, like composite decking boards that are made from recycled timber and plastic. Our home has ceiling fans throughout and we double insulated in the ceiling battens. We also added insulation to the timber walls to minimise thermal gains or losses. Our white roof also offers the best reflectivity to keep the home cool. We also invested in solar panels to generate electricity. They are currently returning the dollar value of the power we consume, a bonus is they also create shade for our roof. How have you incorporated the same thinking into your landscape design? We installed two water tanks (6000L total) to offset water use with maintaining our 120sqm native garden. The other benefit of installing the water tanks where we did was the tanks provide a thermal barrier to a wall that normally gets sun that would ordinarily penetrate heat into the house. We also planted passionfruit vines along this north-west fence to help create shade for the house. We also purposely designed the landscaping to be primarily low maintenance gardens, reducing water usage on maintaining lawn. We have approximately 120sqm of garden planted with mainly native shrubs which can sustain long periods of low water supply. We also considered plant species that wouldn’t create property damage during storms or cyclones. In creating our retaining wall, we built it out of block and rock. The rock was excavated on site and utilised in the design instead of becoming building waste. They now add beauty and form to the garden. What are the benefits you’ve noticed and does it outweigh the outlay? We moved into our new home in mid-February and to date we have not needed any heating and we’ve noticed a reduced dependence on air-conditioning. We’ve noticed our power consumption is generally less than our previous home, which also had solar panels. We worked out our outlay of these sustainable features as being about 10 per cent more on the cost of a new build, but we think the features will quickly return the initial outlay. What inspired you to go sustainable in your home design? We care for the environment and do what we can in our own area. We want to do it – not just talk about it. How have you designed with the future in mind? As retirees, we wanted to ensure the home aged with us. We included things like a wide hallway, wide doorways and no steps, so that the home should allow us to live here for a long time and retain a certain amount of independence. The modifications are not obvious and do not define the house as anything other than a normal house. John and Alison have included use of composite decking material as well as incorporating native plants and water tank irrigation into their landscaping design John and Alison Ready