Eco-house concept: pro and con

Development of American and European real estate construction markets has been more and more concerned with ecology for the last decade. People nowadays seem to be more attentive to their own health. They are now thinking seriously about the health-safety of their housing understanding its great importance.

For the last several hundreds of years the saying 'An Englishman's house his castle' has been quite popular not just among the English, but probably all over the world. It's still quite popular today. However, many professionals involved in the sphere of real estate call it in question. A castle serves as a safe asylum from weather and ill-disposed people. There's hardly anything else that a real castle may mean. That's why the idea of a castle to serve as a home has become rather obsolete.

Evolution brings changes and insists on reconsideration of the housing concepts stimulating mankind to constant perfection of the living space. In 1970s residents faced a new problem that has never occurred before. This happened in the period of Arab-Israeli conflict that placed the world on the edge of a serious energy crisis. Since then people were forced to think over the possibilities to reduce dependence on traditional energy sources. This caused the basis for creating a new concept of the housing in the second half of the last century.

Recessing evolution

Developing and improving production technologies, as well as creating new (and often expensive) construction and domestic materials, led to outbursts of cancer diseases, allergic reactions and chronic fatigue. Mankind is constantly suffering from permanent stresses. What's the reason for it? Ecologists have lots of reasons to believe that many modern materials, or, better to say, substances that they contain are toxic and can cause various illnesses. According to the United Nations Organization, there are about 100'000 chemicals regularly produced in the world today. UN experts only 5 percent of the chemicals are thoroughly studied; about 12 percent are only partially studied, while other 83 are known nothing about. This again emphasizes that there’s no decent information on new substances. And that's what makes most of the medical scientists and ecologists worry. Studying the problem of ecological recession, specialists came to the conclusion and the new concept of people's environment evaluation is vitally important. This evoked the idea of an 'eco-house' with the following basic standards:

-Total power and resource saving
-Application of natural materials in construction, exterior and interior decoration
-Reduction of negative influence on the environment from water supply and sewage system by optimizing of their functioning

Ideologists of the project call it 'the standard ecology pack'.

Full ecology pack

The concept of eco-house was highly estimated by Number 1 billionaire Bill Gates. He became one of the pioneers in this very issue having built a house according to all the above mentioned principles. It's usually hard to find lyric motives in a rational person, isn't it? Mr.Gates was probably guided by rationality when turned his attention to the new concept. It's not surprising that many of wealthy people followed his example ordering development of new projects corresponding to the eco-house concept.

Applying of preferably natural materials is mostly only declared so far. And the reason for it lies in high costs of natural construction and decoration substances. Many people understand just ceramic bricks and wood under natural building materials. However, apart from them, there are others, that most of the builders prefer to know nothing about, as this knowledge reduces profits from the project. Therefore, despite the common sense, materials with low ecological quality are mostly applied. It may sound as a paradox, but nobody seems even to try to listen to ecologists' recommendations. People continue to move in those monster houses even when having information that this kind of real estate not just reduces the quality of their life, but may lead to various disablements. For instance, it's already been proven by specialists that residential properties must not be of metal constructions, especially as a constituent of reinforced concrete. However, construction of reinforced concrete buildings is flourishing at the moment.

And now about the 'full ecology pack' itself… In private construction, not even mentioning city development, this factor is hardly ever taken into consideration. It's easy to convince anybody that the most expensive and prestigious houses today are those provided with isolated system of power and water supply, as well as the heating systems. From the one point of view, these options are quite positive and give a lot of advantages to residents; on the other hand, these systems produce harmful substances and compounds increasing the risk of fatal diseases. And if developers speak broadly about the advantages, they always try to avoid conversations about the potential risks.

Specialists though ring the tocsin - there should be a reasonable compromise between human needs and possibilities of the environment to accumulate and overwork products of human vital functions. The concept of eco-house is based exactly on the balance between the two things.

Mega firmament in real estate ( http://www.realestategates.com/Articles/20102004/mega-firmament-real-estate93486046.html )

Author: Cameron Lindblom, RealEstateGates.com