Affordable Green Demonstration Homes

Supporting residential sustainable building initiatives across the state, COSC plays a key role of fostering collaborative partnerships and providing the community with a valuable educational component. COSC's Affordable Green Demonstration Home program partners with local stakeholders throughout the design and build process, and offers its Affordable Green Building Training series to building professionals, government agencies and homeowners.

Each demonstration home serves as a model of best practices in green building, and is accessible to the public during construction. By focusing on affordable options, the demonstration homes illustrate that green is a very viable and achievable way to improve the quality of life in the local community.

From the inception of these projects years ago that were driven by a vision of Mayor Cownie in Des Moines, Linda Schemmel in West Des Moines, Jeff Geerts and Mark Kvammen in West Union, and Martin Olive in Corning, COSC's role has been to serve as a catalyst for sustainability in these collaborative efforts for community betterment. As the trusted educational resource for sustainable building, COSC emphasizes the importance of supporting existing local professionals, non-profits, services, agencies and other resources to help ensure a self-sustaining community project.

These homes, built in low- to moderate-income neighborhoods, illustrate that green can be attainable and affordable. In leading a collaborative effort with multiple partners, COSC's goal is to promote a platform for consistent, comprehensive, sustainable building trainings where local experts are empowered and national standards are supported.

For more information and to see real-life examples of green homes around Iowa, click the project names below.