Rapid Growth And Popularity Of Green Building

General Trends in the Residential Sector

The need to build green stems from various socio-economic and environmental impacts caused by construction activity.  Impacts to the environment and the people can be reduced significantly through green building practices.

As building professionals seek to build efficiently and responsibly, green building provides ways to preserve our life supporting ecosystems.

Did You Know?

According to the EPA, US buildings account for:

• 39 percent of total energy use
• 12 percent of the total water consumption
• 68 percent of total electricity consumption
• 38 percent of the carbon dioxide emissions

According to the 2008 Buildings Energy Data Book U.S. buildings emissions are approximately equal to the emissions of Japan, France and the United Kingdom combined!

General Trends in the Residential Sector

The 2008 Buildings Energy Data Book provides the following pieces of information that present a snapshot of the trends in the residential sector in the United States.

756 square feet: the average size increase of a new, single family home since 1980, while the average number of household members stayed about the same.

113 million: the number of households in the United States in 2006.

141 million: the number of households in the United States expected by 2030.

27 percent: the percentage of internal gains of a home’s cooling load.

20 percent: the average percentage increase in energy expenditures per household from 1990.

2.18 kWh: the number of kWh’s needed to produce and deliver electricity for every 1 kWh used in the residential sector.

37 percent: the percentage of electricity consumed by the residential sector of all electricity produced in the United States, making it the largest consuming sector of electricity.

31.5 percent: the percentage of total energy expenditures from space heating in the residential sector; this number is more than double any other single end-use.

Carbon dioxide emissions: in the residential sector is attributed to be about the same as the number of carbon dioxide emissions by all of Central and South America combined.

10.4 cents per kWh: the average price of electricity for residential consumers in 2006.

3 percent: the approximate percentage of on-site renewable energy accounted for in the residential sector, most of which derived from wood combustion and was used for space heating.

1 percent growth: the average percentage growth rate estimated from 2006 to 2030 for electricity consumption in the residential sector.

63 percent: the approximate percentage of residential energy expenditures spent on electricity.

$225 billion: the approximate amount spent on energy by residential consumers in 2006.

32.2 million Btu’s: the number of Btu’s of natural gas used by the average family in public multi-family housing.

Green-built homes will save people’s health, money and the planet!

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