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Nuns go green!

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Many people, while building their new homes, start with a handful of environmental guidelines. However, they usually get lost by the time they reach the value engineering stage. Although this may be the usual trend but the Benedictine nuns of the Conventus of Our Lady of Consolation made sure that the environmental guidelines they gave for their new residence was strictly adhered to.
The nuns left their Worcestershire home that had been their residence for the past 171 years and shifted to their new residence at North York Moors national park. The nuns believe that they were spending a lot of money, which they don’t even have, on taking care of their old residence and heating it with oil and gas, which was further harming the environment. This was acting as a hurdle in their living a monastic life, thereby leading to the decision of shifting their residence.

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The new building

• The building costs £4.7 million

• It ensures that the basic materials for the building are sourced as locally as possible

• It has solar panels to provide hot water

• A woodchip boiler fueled by locally-sourced trees

• A roof covered in sedum grass to ensure that the building is better insulated and to attract local wildlife

• The toilets will be flushed from the rainwater collected from some of the roofs

• The structure has a reedbed sewage system, rather than an electrically driven wastewater treatment plant.

• The monastery’s sewage will filter through the reed bed. It will, then be processed through natural anaerobic digestion and the resulting water will seep out onto the surrounding land.

The Benedictine nuns have set an example for all of us. If they can do it, then why cant we? The nuns proved it that if you really want something and if you stick by it, nobody can stop you from having it. They wanted a residence, which was as environmental friendly as possible, and so they got it. Then why do we lose our focus in between?

Via: treehugger

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