Minimising the impact that a building has on the land has sustainable benefits. Any artificial structure on a site has an effect. Many of these impacts are negative. Hence, minimising your home’s impact on the land or terrain is vital.
The construction industry has had a tremendous effect on our environment. From manufacturing building products to operating a building, it has a significant adverse impact on our natural environment.
One sustainable approach to home design is ensuring that your construction does not impact the site more than it needs to.
Here are some ideas to consider for minimising your home’s impact on the land.
Occupy The Least Amount Of The Land As Possible
We are in an age where large homes are the “in thing”. Our homes occupy a large percentage of the lot. We often see bigger as better as we try to squeeze every bit of usable square footage into our homes.
However, it is no surprise that the bigger your home is, the more of the existing land it will disturb. That means less space for plants, trees and earth. These things are what helps maintain a sustainable environment.
But more and more single-family dwelling homes are becoming larger. This fact occurs along with the increasing demand for housing to support rising populations. Hence, our natural land is dwindling.
I see this occurring in my home country Barbados. When the home is complete, there is little land space leftover for trees and gardening.
Therefore, it is a good idea to consider building your home that only includes what you need.
Minimise Excavation Of The Land
Clearing and excavating a site is a significant part of the preparation and structure of a house or building. Removing the vegetation and earth to start building your home is a critical stage.
In the past, traditional homes in hilly, tropical terrains would usually have minimum impact on the site.
They would typically build them to fall with the slope of the land or be on stilts or columns above the natural terrain.
This type of construction would allow homes to be above any naturally flowing floodwaters. More of the site could stay intact. Hence, natural terrains, earth and rainwater runoff did not change. This situation had sustainable benefits to the site and would also avoid unnatural changes to further watercourses downhill.
However, technology in earth moving equipment became more prevalent.
In addition, modern styles of architecture became more popular across the world. However, one of the hallmarks of modern architecture is its “placelessness”. This idea meant it could go anywhere. Hence, clearing and excavating a site down to a level piece of land was typical.
However, I still believe that maintaining the land’s natural slope is ideal. You should try to avoid excavating too much into the ground where possible. This approach is more sustainable and maintains the natural environment.
Incorporate More Vegetation On Your Land
If you reduce the size of your home and minimise the amount of clearing and excavation, there would be more land left. But what do you do with it?
Of course, the environmental solution is to grow plants and trees.
Plants and trees around your home have several benefits. They are apparent sustainable benefits of providing more trees in your community and region.
I am sure you often hear of the importance of trees and vegetation to our environment. Massive campaigns to plant and maintain more trees and forests are going on worldwide.
Hence, I believe this is an ideal step for individual homeowners. The more we can increase the natural environment around our homes and communities, the better.
In addition, it is best to use grass, plants and trees that are native to your climate or region. These tend to require less maintenance and watering.
But apart from the environmental impact, trees and plants around your home can help provide shade. Hence, creating a cooler and more thermally comfortable home in hot tropical climates.
In addition, they are other health and psychological benefits through biophilic design principles.
They can also increase our source of food. I like the idea of incorporating food-bearing plants into your landscaping strategies.
Therefore, I suggest that you avoid adding extensive pavements and other hard surfaces around your home. Though they may be easier to maintain than landscaping, you lose a lot of the sustainability and other benefits.
More hard surfaces also mean fewer places for rainwater to permeate into the ground and get to our groundwater supply. This issue is a primary concern in several tropical countries.
Climate change is causing a reduction in rainfall in some regions, causing significant water scarcity problems.
Conclusion
Designing our tropical homes and communities with more sustainable approaches is ideal. These approaches should include encouraging better use and preservation of the natural land.
Creating a home that the size of it suits your needs only is an excellent start to reducing the amount of land you occupy.
In addition, avoid extensive excavation where possible. This strategy leaves more land in its natural state and is most effective on sloping sites.
Finally, use your land to grow more trees and plants. Vegetation has significant environmental and other benefits.
Featured image by Richard Hunter-Rice from Pexels