Here at Country Club Homes, Inc, we make every effort to incorporate green construction techniques into the building process, and have posted here on the blog about three important strategies. Check out these posts if any of these subjects are of interest to you:

Fairfield County Green Home Building Strategy #1 – Passive Solar
Fairfield County Green Home Building Strategy #2 – Energy Saving Materials & Systems
Fairfield County Green Home Building Strategy #3 – Building Envelope & Air Quality

We have dedicated one page on the Country Club Homes Inc. website to the subject of green construction, addressing the topic from various angles. We’d like to begin this post by defining green construction, and then we will discuss how to minimize waste in the construction process.

Every Fairfield County home builder desiring to exercise responsibility in construction practices recognizes the importance of minimizing waste during the construction process. This is done for a number of reasons, primarily as part of an overall plan to promote holistic green construction practices.

Green construction is defined as, “Increasing the efficiency with which buildings and their sites use and harvest energy, water, and materials…” Minimizing waste during construction is an important part of green construction, and this process starts with careful product and material selection.

Product and Material Selection: Sustainable and responsible construction methods include the selective choice of building products that produce as little waste as possible in their manufacture, use and disposal.

Product selection also includes the use of sustainable and recyclable building products that demonstrate life cycle cost benefits in the building. The second significant method of building with as little waste as possible is through effective strategies and applied expertise in the design phase of the building process.

Applying Architectural Expertise in the Design Phase: Some of the critical issues and strategies to consider in the design phase of a building are:

• Utilizing standard dimensions in the design that correspond to standard building material sizes
• Select framing details that incorporate standard building sizes. This requires that only construction savvy, seasoned and knowledgeable architects, engineers, and designers be responsible for the design details in order to incorporate these framing and construction details in the design and documentation phases.
• When remodeling, or for new construction; evaluate if using salvaged (or recycled) building materials would be energy and cost-effective.

Construction Practices: The third noteworthy method of minimizing waste during construction is through effective construction practices. The following construction practices from an article published by the Nebraska Energy Office outline smart waste prevention practices:

• Maintain, protect, organize and inventory all building products to prevent loss or damage during construction
• Request all suppliers to buy back unused product
• Have suppliers deliver all product in/on sturdy containers or pallets; have these containers and pallets picked up by suppliers routinely during construction
• Ascertain that all products are stored on or off-site in weather proof conditions
• Organize scrap material during construction to be utilized as fire blocking, spacers in header construction and in other ways

Are you a Wilton, New Canaan or Fairfield County, Connecticut homeowner planning to build a new home, renovation, addition or remodeling project?

Our trusted family business, Country Club Homes, Inc., has been serving southwestern Connecticut residents for decades. We offer custom luxury new home construction in many popular local communities. For more information, contact our Wilton, CT. office by calling 203.762.0550.

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