Britain’s most eco-friendly home? Posh house with grass-roofed garage and fingerprint scanner on sale for £2million
A SUPER modern eco-house that runs on renewable energy and has a grass-covered garage has gone on the market for £2million.
The striking Sussex home – which looks like a curved fossil shell – is also kitted out with a fingerprint scanner to unlock the front door.
Other high-tech tools include a wireless camera security system and built-in audio speakers which can be controlled by an iPad.
The five-bed pad - called The Spiral, in Worth, West Sussex - is 4,000 sq ft and has an open-plan kitchen diner, living room, a wood-clad corridor and a dressing room.
Meanwhile, sliding doors open to a landscaped terrace with a built-in hot tub and a lowered fire pit surrounded by stone benches.
A detached garage which has a grass-covered roof is also included, making it appear sunken into the gardens also appears beyond the house.
Alongside this, the property is surrounded on the outside by a path which branches off from the private drive and curves around the semicircular home, leading to the round entrance door.
The Spiral runs on a mix of renewable sources, including solar and geothermal – or, heat from the ground – energy.
It also has a recovery ventilation system which supplies fresh air while making sure no heat is lost.
The current owners have spent 18 months designing and building the property.
How do solar panels work?
Here's what you need to know...
- Solar panels are a method of generating electricity, which can be used or stored for later
- A panel is made up of many smaller units called PV (photovoltaic) cells
- These cells linked together make up a solar panel
- The cells are typically two pieces of silicon stacked on top of each other
- Each slice of silicon has oppositely charged – one positive and one negative
- This creates an electrical junction between the layers
- Then when photons from sunlight knocks an electron free from an atom, the electric field pushes that electron out of the silicon junction
- Either side of the cell are metal conductive plates that collect the electrons, and then transfer them to wires
- And from there, the electrons can be used just like any other type of electricity
Darren Middleton of Hamptons International Haywards Heath office, said: "It's got impressive eco-credentials, running on geo and solar energy.
"But it's not just for technology's sake – it will assist you on a day-to-day basis.
"You never know how often people choose to put the heating on of course, but probably for most of the year, it's a fairly cost-neutral property as well."
"We've had interest so far from families, as the open-plan nature of the kitchen space fits with day to day living, but also from second-home buyers."
Eco-homes are part of a growing trend that reflect humanity's increasing engagement with the global climate crisis.
This week, experts warned that the world has already crossed nine key "tipping points" that will lead to catastrophic climate change.
Passing the alarming milestones means "we are in a state of planetary emergency" that could see humanity wiped from the planet.
Points of no return picked out by the team include the loss of the Amazon rainforest and the great ice sheets of Antarctica and Greenland – damage from which our planet may never recover.
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In other news, seaside towns have been urged to move inland as climate chaos now means a "retreat" is needed, top scientists have warned.
Experts have also warned that Britain could be as hot as Spain in just three decades.
And eating human corpses could "solve the global warming crisis", one mad scientist claims.
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