IVINS – A Southern Utah home builder won a national builder’s award last month for building a green home in Kayenta.

Jake Joines, owner of J2 Construction, received national recognition on July 19 as one of the winners of the National EcoHome Design Awards. According to EcoHome Magazine, the award goes to builders who “show continued progress in environmental design and demonstrate that the integration of rich architectural design and true technical performance is clearly taking hold.”

The 2012 competition included over 2,500 applicants, and only 17 from across the country were chosen as winners. The home that Joines built, named “Terra Caelo,” is one of those 17 winners, and is also the only home in Utah to be recognized this year.

“I am very honored to have received this national recognition,” Joines said. “It is my passion to build homes that are energy efficient and healthy to live in.”

The home is over 5,000-square feet in size and was built in February as a part of the 2012 St. George area Parade of Homes.

The home is cooled and heated by a 10-zone climate control system and is illuminated completely with LED lighting. There are photovoltaic and solar thermal panels that produce an abundance of electricity and hot water year round. Many earth-friendly and cost-saving features are utilized throughout the home.

According to EcoHome Magazine, the Terra Caelo is owned by former Apple employees from California. Through the use of downloaded applications on their iPhones and iPads, the homeowners are able to monitor their home’s energy use and generation.

The home also included dedicated circuits for recharging electric vehicles*.

“The award puts St. George on the map as a place where people are trying to be proactive in energy efficiency,” Joines said. He added being recognized for building a green home would also help make people become better aware of green technologies.

“There’s a lot of cool technology out there that people don’t know is available,” he said. “Many people just aren’t aware.”

The art of building homes hasn’t changed much over the last century, Joines said, but thanks to newer, more efficient energy systems, people could experience a “healthier environment” in their homes.
Joines is also the chairman of the Southwest Green Build Council and has over 15 years of construction experience. J2 is a recognized green builder and has built three of the four National Association of Home Builders-certified green homes in Southern Utah. He encourages anyone with questions about green building to contact him via J2 Construction’s website.

 

* On a related topic, see St. George News story on Ivins resident Mark Larsen, the first recipient of an electric Nissan Leaf in Utah.

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Twitter: @MoriKessler

Copyright 2012 St. George News.