Review of Converting to an Eco Friendly Home
Review Of Converting To An Eco Friendly Home
A review of Paul Hymers' book Converting to an Eco-Friendly Home: The Complete Handbook
shopping | general | energy efficiency | carbonThis is a review of
Converting to an Eco-Friendly Home: The Complete Handbook by
Paul Hymers, published by
New Holland Publishers with ISBN
978-1-84537-406-8 and an RRP of GBP 7.99.
There are now quite a few books on building and converting homes to make them more
eco-friendly. This 176 page book by
Paul Hymers - a qualified Building Control Officer - explains how it is possible to make homes much healthier, to
save money, help the environment, and to
reduce energy consumption by making small and large changes to our homes.
Contents of the Book
The book is split into the following seven main chapters:
LIGHT: improve the lighting in a home - with particular attention to increasing
natural light. Skylights, rooflights, and
light tubes are all covered in detail, as is converting artificial lights to low energy equivalents such as
CFL's and
LED's.
POWER: how do we use power (electricity), and how can we generate our own. After an introduction to typical domestic power requirements,
PV solar panels and
micro wind turbines are discussed in detail, followed by a brief
introduction to biomass and a guide to
saving electricity.
HEAT: heating your home and heating water. An introduction to domestic
solar water heating systems, boilers, and
geothermal heating (for example ground source heat pumps) and their use with
under floor heating.
SHELTER: passive cooling and heating, building materials, flooring, and insulation.
An introduction to cooling and warming a home naturally - i.e. using the concepts of a
passive house. This is followed by a guide to building materials,
insulation techniques and materials, and a focus on eco-friendly flooring.
AIR: an introduction to
air pollution,
sick building syndrome (SBS), volatile organic compounds (VOCs), radon, and electromagnetic fields. This is followed by a detailed guide to improving
ventilation to improve the
air quality in our homes.
WASTE: how to
reduce, reuse, recycle, with a guide to recycled and recyleable materials.
WATER: how to reduce
water consumption, and an introduction to
greywater and
rainwater harvesting.
REUK Book Review
Overall this is an
excellent book. The black and white illustrations are clear and relevant to the accompanying text which is written in an easy and enjoyable style. Every page is
packed full of information from the front to the back cover (so no paper is wasted!).
The
index and
glossary are both thorough, and there is also a page of
useful contacts which could have done with being extended somewhat as it is a bit limited.
Calling this book the
complete handbook is a bit of an exaggeration, but the author has certainly covered all main topics to sufficient depth to whet the appetite of the reader to go out and obtain more information elsewhere.
We are certainly happy to
recommend this readable and informative book to our site visitors.
Buy Converting to an Eco-Friendly Home
Converting to an Eco-Friendly Home is available in most major bookshops, and also online priced at
£7.99 or less. Click here to purchase it now at a
discount from
Amazon.co.uk:
Converting to an Eco-Friendly Home: The Complete Handbook.
Other Reading
If you are interested in
Converting to an Eco-Friendly Home then you will also be interested in reading our review of
Eco-House Manual.
Article Last Modified: 09:15, 14th Mar 2009Comment on this Article
If you have any comments on this article, please email them to
neil@reuk.co.uk.
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