World Wisdom: Best Cities for Self-Sustaining Homes

 

A self-sustaining home can help you save money, become self-reliant, and live in harmony with nature. It helps save the planet, too. But which of the biggest U.S. cities are ideal for building your own eco-conscious home? To find out, Lawn Love ranked 2022’s Best Cities for Self-Sustaining Homes. They considered 17 factors, such as solar potential and generation and friendliness to off-grid and sustainable lifestyles. They also looked at the number of existing green and LEED-certified homes, as well as laws and limitations related to composting and water use. Check out the 10 best (and 10 worst) cities for taking off in your Earthship below, followed by key insights from our report. (See where your city ranks.)

Best Cities for Self-Sustaining Homes Rank City 1 Los Angeles, CA 2 San Francisco, CA 3 San Diego, CA 4 Austin, TX 5 Denver, CO 6 San Jose, CA 7 Seattle, WA 8 Portland, OR 9 Sacramento, CA 10 Oakland, CA Worst Cities for Self-Sustaining Homes Rank City 1 Anchorage, AK 2 Paterson, NJ 3 Pembroke Pines, FL 4 Jackson, MS 5 Miramar, FL 6 Fort Wayne, IN 7 Cary, NC 8 Joliet, IL 9 Hialeah, FL 10 Buffalo, NY

Key insights: Follow the LEED-er: Head out West where eight green cities sprouted to the top 10 of our ranking. California LEEDs the way with Los Angeles at No. 1 both overall and in LEED-certified surface area. Eco-minded California is a great place for developing energy-efficient passive home projects.  Outside California, Seattle (No. 7) and Portland (No. 8) have plenty of LEED-certified homes despite low solar power potential. These cities also have great access to sustainable home builders to help create your green dream home. Go green, cowpokes: Texas is the best state for living off-grid, so it’s no surprise that it’s also a superb state for building self-sustaining homes. Solar power has also been keeping this fast-growing state’s grid running throughout this hot summer.  Austin lands at No. 4, while Houston (No. 13) and Dallas (No. 14) also impress. These cities each have abundant green homes for sale, and plenty of sustainable home builders and solar contractors for hire, on top of a high Self-Reliance score.  Self-sustaining crossroads: You might need a self-reliant attitude to survive in Alaska, but that doesn’t make it an ideal spot for an autonomous home. Anchorage slips to the bottom at No. 200 next to Paterson, New Jersey, and a handful of Florida cities. It’s hard to be energy-independent in these cities, where solar potential is low and access to sustainable contractors and eco-conscious homes is slim. Decreased daylight in the winter can explain Alaska’s reluctance to embrace solar panels (on top of the state’s booming oil industry). However, interest in solar is growing as the cost of solar energy dips below fossil fuels.    The full ranking and analysis are available here: https://lawnlove.com/blog/best-cities-self-sustaining-homes/   Don’t underestimate landscaping and lawn care’s impact on your self-reliant lifestyle. Eco-friendly lawn care helps conserve water and energy. So, if you plan to grow drought-tolerant grass, hire a local Lawn Love pro to help you maintain it.