Brownfield Developer Launches GreenHome Project

On April 3, Cherokee Investment Partners officially broke ground on its Mainstream GreenHome project in Raleigh, North Carolina. The project is designed to demonstrate that an environmentally efficient house can be built on a conventional lot, in an existing neighborhood.
 
“We are seizing the opportunity to influence the greening of large-scale development and vertical construction. Starting with the tens of thousands of homes that will be built on the sites we are currently cleaning up, we have launched our green initiative, and we are kicking it off with the Mainstream GreenHome. Not only are we cleaning and greening hundreds of brownfield sites nationally, but we are exploring innovative ways to integrate more sustainable features into the horizontal and vertical construction of our sites,” said Tom Darden, CEO of Cherokee.

The Mainstream GreenHome showcases a number of innovative, environmentally friendly features, while looking and functioning as a traditional home. Cherokee expects that the lessons learned from this project will encourage the mainstreaming of sustainable homebuilding practices nationwide.  The Mainstream GreenHome is intended to help reverse the negative stigma sometimes associated with green building and show that environmentally focused construction is compatible with conventional building and better living.

Cherokee’s GreenHome is the first home in the nation known to be built in a typical subdivision under the National Association of Home Builders’ (NAHB) Model Green Home Building Guidelines and is just one of three green homes in the nation known to meet such guidelines. In addition, the home will be certified with the U.S. EPA/ U.S. Department of Energy Energy Star Program and the North Carolina Solar Center’s Healthy Built Homes state program, among others.

Conventional in almost every aspect, the GreenHome is designed as an idea home that will showcase a mix of products, systems and techniques that could make sense for individual construction projects or large-scale developments. As green building becomes more mainstream and is injected into the early design process, costs associated with green building will continue to fall.

In addition, many technologies, such as solar hot water or ground source heat pumps, become more cost effective as centralized systems in larger developments. Environmental factors are taken into account in every aspect of the home, from landscaping using edible and/or drought tolerant plants to rainwater catchment and reuse systems.

The GreenHome is expected to be completed in the fall of 2006 and will be available for tours. BFN