With 2012 Earth Day festivities just around the corner many homeowners are either starting a new push towards a more sustainable lifestyle, while others are taking the opportunity to reinvigorate their eco-friendly home and lifestyle. In the spirit of the coming celebrations we have three items for your home that look great and making living a green lifestyle a little bit easier…

Simple Human Recycling Trash Can-Separating your recycling can be a pain if you don’t have a proper set up inside. If you have limited space but want to install a recycling center in your home, Simple Human has a series of recycling trash cans that have double liners perfect for separating your waste from your recycleables – and they even have specially sized liners that will fit perfectly in the smaller can.

Algreen 50 Gallon Rain Barrel with Top Planter – An increasingly popular fixture in backyards and home gardens, and great way to conserve and reduce your water usage, are rain barrels. These barrels affix to your gutter down spout to capture runoff, which can then be used to water gardens and landscaping. Though many are simply designed to look, well more or less like a barrel, this urn shaped rain barrel looks like a garden decoration and even doubles as a planter.

Solar Powered iPad Charging Case – Electronics and their chargers are notorious for being power vampires.We recommend unplugging unused charging cords and appliances, or even better you can start using the natural energy of the sun to charge your iPad-straight form the case. The leather material makes for a great looking case, and the innovative solar panel saves electricity while keeping your battery from running on empty.

Going green can still be gorgeous…and with these great green home products convenient too!

Here is a shot of a home being built in the Contempri Homes factory in Pickneyville, IL.

I’ve written before about modular home construction, and how more and more of our clients are asking about the process. To help them learn more about it, I had to do my homework. And the more I’ve learned, the more I realize it’s a legitimate way to build a new home.

Part of my homework included a trip to Contempri Homes in Pinkneyville, Illinois. There I was able to see the construction process in person. What impressed me the most was the concept of building a custom home backwards. That may sound funny, so please let me explain.

When homes are built in a factory, manufacturers install the drywall first, then work backwards installing exterior sheathing and siding last. This allows the crews to work from the back side, paying close attention to properly caulking and insulating the structure for an air-tight envelope. This is critical when building high performance homes. In addition, using full lengths of unbroken drywall at all wall intersections and corners helps improve the thermal envelope. Drywall also comes first when building the roof and it runs to the exterior edge of the walls so there are no air gaps at the ceiling perimeters which can be very difficult to seal.

Here you can see studs in to the drywall from the exterior of the modular home.

I already knew of the other benefits to modular construction – working in a controlled environment which is not susceptible to the weather, being able to control and reuse waste, new homes being built in a matter of weeks instead of months, and that a modular home undergoes more inspections than a site built home. But what excites me the most is that modular homes are also being verified green through programs such as the National Green Building Standards, Energy Star, and USGBC’s LEED.

I’m sold and ready to build our first modular home, and fortunately we have a client interested as well. They are a wonderful young couple from South St. Louis County who already have a lot. They’ve taken a very active role in learning about modular construction as well, having already visited two modular factories.

The Hibbs Homes crew stops for a photo opp with the Contempri Homes crew.

They’re interested in building modular for several reasons – a better built home, environmentally friendly construction, and saving money. The modular industry says you can save up to 15% building a modular home and we’re going to put that claim to the test.

We’re going to share information about the project from start to finish, writing about all phases of the construction process here on the blog. You can follow our journey by subscribing to the blog via our RSS feed using your favorite reader, or you can have it delivered right to you by subscribing via email. It should be an interesting one, and hopefully you’ll come along for the ride!

If you’ve worked thirty years as a home builder in St Louis, you could probably write the book on it. And our new consulting partner, Matt Belcher of Verdatek Solutions, did just that. Matt is one of the green building industry’s leading professionals, and in 2009 he published the book, Build Green and Save: Protecting The Earth and Your Bottom Line.

In his book he discusses the cost and environmental savings of choosing a knowledgeable and certified green builder, how to select green building materials, shares information on green construction techniques, and more. It is a wealth of information for custom home builders and has offers a lot of insight to buyers who want to build a home.

As you can imagine, writing a book about green building requires a lot of expertise and experience, and that is why we are thrilled to have Matt on the Hibbs Homes team. We are working in partnership with Matt and a host of trade partners to build the first Active House in the USA, and he is working with us on many other residential construction projects throughout the St. Louis area as well.

Matt has been actively involved in the St. Louis construction industry for more than thirty years, and he spent six years as a top building codes official. He has specialized in energy efficient, and sustainable commercial and residential development, and has consulted on large sustainable mixed-use commercial and residential developments.

Matt is also a leading educator in green and sustainable building practices. As a Technical Partner with the University of Missouri’s Center for Sustainable Energy and Stormwater Education Center, he educates building industry professionals and government administrators to help create commercial, residential and agricultural developments that are safer, cleaner, more energy efficient, and better for the environment.

Matt also serves as Chair of the National Association of Home Builders Green Building sub-committee, and also serves on their Energy and Construction Codes and Standards committees. He was appointed by the ICC to serve in the development of the new International Green Construction Code and was recently appointed to the ICC’s Residential Energy Committee.

Aside from serving the building industry, he has also been instrumental in is serving nationally to help advance green building. He  has lent his expertise to lobby for, and in the development of, green building legislation. As a member of the Construction Dispute Resolution Services National Panel of Green Construction Specialists he advised on how to manage legal risks associated with commercial and residential green building. And in 2008 he testified to the U.S. House Energy and Air Quality Subcommittee on Climate Benefits of Improved Building Energy Efficiency. Most recently he was invited to serve in an international role as part of the Active House Alliance’s specification group.

We are excited to be able to utilize Matt’s outstanding expertise and skills to grow our company, and even better serve our custom home building clients in St. Louis. And as construction nears on Active House USA we are excited to bring Matt more into the fold.