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Green home design still niche market; designer helps build using local materials |
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Written by Robert Koopmans, Kamloops Daily News
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Tuesday, 10 November 2009 |
KAMLOOPS, B.C. — Chris Sundquist is more than just “the straw bale home guy.”
That’s the moniker he acquired at a recent green energy show in Kamloops — a label he doesn’t mind wearing — but the fact is, the niche designer knows a lot more about green technology than using straw bales as walls.
He knows green roofs, overhangs, geothermal, passive solar and grey water systems — all the stuff required to build a house that uses significantly less energy than a typical “2x6 stick house.”
For three years, Sundquist has run his business, Think Tank Designs, from his home in Barnhartvale, just east of Kamloops. He helps people design their dream green homes after he’s finished his day job.
Sundquist said the work isn’t really like work because he has a strong personal interest in green technology. He likes the challenge of designing houses that incorporate the technology in useful ways.
As well, he specializes in designing homes that eschew manufactured components in favour of materials acquired locally, often from the very land upon which they will be built.
Most houses these days are built with steel studs or manufactured 2x4s or 2x6s that come from distant mills or factories. His plans use local materials — wood often milled on site, for example — as much as possible.
“I work with (people) from the ground up, helping them to build the best possible house that uses the least amount of energy,” he said. “I like building interesting homes that uses what is already on the land.”
Sundquist admits his is a niche market. While almost everyone professes to want a green house, not many are actually prepared to take the step.
Even though green houses like straw bale homes are as solid and permanent as more traditional technology, only the most environmentally dedicated take the plunge.
The recent economic downtown hasn’t helped, said Sundquist, adding even fewer people these days seem to want to pay the added “green” construction premium, even if it means big cost savings down the road.
“While people are interested in the reduced costs over time, the upfront costs are a little daunting,” he said, adding building green can add 10 to 15 per cent.
Education is also a big part of getting people to think green. While everyone is willing to accept geothermal heating as a viable option, most people still raise an eyebrow when offered straw bales as an option for use as structural walls and insulation.
But straw-bale building technology has been around for many years, he added. In California, its use is governed by building codes and is accepted as a viable construction material.
Another part of green education is helping people think differently about a home’s interior space. Most new homes today are much bigger than they need to be, he said, and as a result they waste a lot of energy.
He believes an average family needs no more than about 1,200 to 1,500 square feet of house. Even that is not as efficient as it could be.
“People have huge living rooms because they can. There is no need for (a house) to be (4,000 square feet). It’s just esthetic,” Sundquist said.
He said he is also in the process of designing his own dream home, for his family. He sees it as a showcase of green technology and wants to build it with a “green deck” — a deck that is covered with vegetation and turf.
He sees the deck blending seamlessly with the hillside behind his house creating a natural green space in a small area that would never have allowed a yard because of the steepness of the terrain.
Sundquist’s most ambitious and most successful project to date was a new straw bale rancher in Knutsford, just south of Kamloops, he designed with the couple who later built it.
Since then, he’s developed a few new clients and hopes to continue to expand as the word gets out.
“It’s something I’m interested in. There are always one or two people at a time interested,” he said. “I like doing things that are not a drain on the environment.”
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