This homeowners’ resource guide is distributed three times a year to 100,000 Toronto homes in mature neighbourhoods.

Our Green Home is focused on helping homeowners make healthy, environmentally responsible choices in renovating, decorating, managing and enjoying their homes.

No longer can we think of our homes as merely shelter, due to global warming, decreasing air quality, lower lake levels, water pollution, indoor air pollution and urban sprawl, to name just a few of the problems facing Ontarians. In Our Green Home, we encourage a wider understanding of the places we live, to make the links between our homes, our environment and our quality of life, and find ways to make improvements to our homes and home practices.

From an ecological perspective, we look at the materials used to construct our homes, where these materials come from and how they are processed, as well as look at the things that come into and go out of our homes, to find ways of living sustainably within our ecosystem. Indeed, our homes are part of the ecosystem. If we look, we can see where our homes intersect the environment. For instance, they are often made of natural materials, such as wood, stone (concrete), clay (brick), tar (shingles), metals (wires and pipes), and sand (glass), in addition to synthetic materials such as plastics and paints which also have ingredients from the natural environment.

Our homes are also connected to our environment through normal, everyday use. Air blows in through the windows; electricity, produced from coal, nuclear, wind, hydroelectric or solar, zips in through the wires; natural gas comes in through underground pipes; water is pumped in from wells and lakes; and we carry in fruits, vegetables, other foods and personal care and cleaning products. Going out of our homes, waste water is sent to septic systems and treatment facilities that is eventually released back into the environment.

This is where our homes and environment meet, and where we can make choices that are easier on our environment and beneficial to ourselves and our communities. A green planet starts with a green home.