When Brian Taylor looks out the window of his home in EchoHaven, the view is a street lined with houses of varying architectural styles.

However, beneath the surface, many of those homes have similar characteristics designed to make them eco-friendly and highly energy efficient in a development purposefully built with no natural gas service.

Saving the planet is a good thing, but if you can put some green in your jeans at the same time, all the better. As interest in homes with environmentally friendly features grows among buyers and sellers, the popularity of green designations for REALTORS® is also on the rise.

More than 750 new single-family homes in Alberta will be powered by solar this year, as Jayman Built makes the green technology a standard feature in a first-of-its-kind offering by any Canadian builder.

One of the most interesting trends these days in the homebuilding industry is the growing popularity of net-zero homes.

Winter may have put the chill on cycling for many Calgarians, but the City of Calgary's recent Winter Cycling Congress cast a spotlight on Calgary's efforts to make two-wheeled transport accessible for even more Calgarians.

What do you do if you only have one sunny bed to grow tomatoes and you use that same bed every year?

It may seem too early to chat about tomatoes, but like other gardeners, you might already be thinking about buying seed and questions are bound to follow.

Lighter snow than normal in December has gardeners in Calgary wondering about watering their trees and perennial beds this month.

I remember wearing shorts on the deck in December in the '90s, so this is not the first time we've had warm weather at this time of year. But dry winters are rare, so let's review the rulebook for gardeners about winter watering. The short answer is, don't do it.

A beautiful, well-designed and well-crafted home is about more than the pretty countertops and gleaming floors. Often, what lies beneath the surface is just as important.

It's rough and coarse and won't blow away with the first Chinook. This well-kept secret also does more good for trees than any form of fertilizer or last-minute winter watering, and it's time to add it now.

Canmore's Spring Creek uses geothermal to lessen its environmental footprint

As the Alberta government doubles down on solar power alternatives through policy and rebates, some wonder if geothermal will also receive the same kind of attention.

Frank Kernick, developer of Canmore's multi-million-dollar Spring Creek hopes the provincial government will help offset geothermal installation costs through a rebate program, similar to the Residential and Commercial Solar Program.