Monthly Archives: December 2011

Scheming to Reduce Energy

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- by Anne Sanker, Owner of The Coloured House

Should the Australian Government introduce an incentive scheme to encourage consumers to purchase suitable window coverings to reduce their energy use?  What is your answer – yes or no??

This suggestion has come from a well known Queensland blind manufacturer, Frank Cairns, who is convinced such a program would have greater merit than the controversial home insulation program introduced as part of the Commonwealth stimulus package.

In a concerted lobbying campaign, he has written letters to state and federal government representatives calling for home owners to receive a financial incentive to install window furnishings that enable greater energy efficiency.  The recipients of these letters included minister s Peter Garrett and Penny Wong as well as various Queensland government representatives.

“There’s twice as much heat loss through a window than a roof”, he says.  In Frank’s opinion, they would have been better spending the money on a window than a roof. 1

He then goes on to say that the home insulation program had limited benefits for Australian employment.  If an incentive program for the window furnishing industry was commended than it would create jobs for the domestic manufacturing market and would filter throughout the supply chain.

This view of including window coverings as part of the energy efficiency rating scheme is supported by many Australian manufacturers but seems to have no voice in the halls of Parliament.  For commercial application, the importance of coverings has been addressed and aided some large multi-storey office towers to achieve accreditation – however there doesn’t seem to be any flow on effect into the domestic market.

Many of the fabric manufacturers can produce certificates detailing insulation, UV ratings, solar absorption, and solar reflection percentages – however this does not seem to bear enough weight to be considered.

It begs the question – how long will it take for the argument to gain momentum and the government to finally include this as an additional item on the energy efficiency score card?

 

1 Reference: Window Furnishings Australia magazine

The Environmental Fibre

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by Anne Sanker – Owner of The Coloured House

When you are thinking of window coverings for your home, do environmental issues come to the fore? Yes. When good quality coverings are in place they do mean better insulation for the home so less electricity use for the air con. So this is in fact a tick for the environment.

But what about the fibres that are woven into the yarns to manufacture the fabric?  How do we consider the environment when discussing the essence of the window covering?

Linen and hemp have been grown for thousands of years providing warmth, protection and comfort.  Hemp requires absolutely no chemical sprays at all during its growing cycle. Linen also grows well with minimal chemicals used in its production and requires significantly less than most other textile fibre crops.  Linen and hemp fields do not require additional irrigation other than that supplied by nature.

Fields of linen and hemp are gentle on the land and fit seamlessly into modern crop rotation cycles.  Harvesting and processing linen and hemp fibre uses very little energy and does not harm the environment.  Linen and hemp can be processed using the environmentally friendly dew-retting method.

In the production phase, spinning and weaving linen and hemp fibres has very little effect on the environment.  The weaving mills are constantly investing in new equipment and production methods, to reduce the need for energy and water, and are eliminating or recycling most of the waste.

One of these mills is a New Zealand based company – Hemptech.  As a source of energy, Hemptech’s mills use natural gas through reducing air pollution.  Constant improvements are being made on the spinning and weaving machinery to allow their mills to monitor and conserve the use of energy.

All bleaching and dyeing of Hemptech yarn and fabric conforms to strict European E.E.C environmental standards.  Their mills have invested heavily to process all waste water using state of the art biological water-recycling plants.

All Hemptech fabrics are 100% chloride free and are bleached by the environmentally sound alternative – peroxide.

Their printed fabrics are produced using high quality water based printing inks which provide high performance to add to the lifespan of the product.  It is not yet possible to print with natural inks and still achieve an acceptable product lifespan.

Once linen and hemp fabrics have reached the end of their useful life they can then be recycled into paper products or insulation materials.  Hemptech ships all its fabric cutting waste to the Paper Mill, a company dedicated to recycling waste fibre products into beautiful recycled paper gift items. (www.papermill.co.nz)

Here at The Coloured House we have proudly added Hemptech to our diverse range of drapery fabrics, as we recognise the need to commit to sustainability and best environmental practices.