Habitat For Humanity Goes Green From Now On

Flower City Habitat for Humanity is taking a big step in going green. From now on, all of the new homes that are built will be energy star qualified.

Since it began in 1984, Flower City Habitat for Humanity has built 180 homes in Rochester.

Starting now, they'll enter a new chapter. Because all of the future homes will be energy star qualified.

"We have always tried to do some of our houses with green building standards. We have one house now that is energy star certified but we've decided we'd like to take the next step and do all of our future homes that we build as energy star labeled," says Bethany Cramer From Habitat for Humanity Communications.

The label means the homes are very energy efficient. Special attention will be paid to insulation

"Think about the air exchange in your house. Have you sealed the draft, are the windows tight, do you have proper insulation, have you looked through all the spaces where air can flow through your house? We're doing that as we build it gives us a better chance to seal the envelop," says Habitat for Humanity Board Member Kimie Romeo.

Habitat has been building energy efficient homes all along, but they hope by becoming certified, it will send a message to the whole community. "We talk a lot about living in a sustainable community I think for all of us we can look to habitat as leaders in this new building," Romeo adds.

And the people who live in the habitat homes, will also see the rewards. Romeo says, "they're going to have more money to pay the mortgage and eat better and do what they have to do because they will spend less money on those energy costs."

Flower city habitat for humanity is joining other habitat chapters in this effort. The hope is that at some point, all habitat homes around the globe will be built this way.