Home, green home: living roofs and other ways to save energy

Rannva Danielsen

15 August 2011

I've just returned from holiday in the Faroe Islands, where I grew up and my family still lives. I showed my holiday pictures to my friends when I came back and they all said: "Aww, it looks beautiful." But some pictures got more comments than any others.

See, there are a few things we do differently in the Faroes. Being located in the middle of the North Atlantic Ocean - pretty isolated from the rest of the world - we have often had to make do with the resources that are naturally available to us. We eat a lot of fish and breed so many sheep that they outnumber our population of 48,000 a few times. It also means we have a rather unusual way of insulating our homes.

To keep warm during those cold winter nights (and summer too - it doesn't get very warm) we grow lawns on our roofs.

It sounds funny but it really does the job. When you walk through the centre of our small capital, Tórshavn, you see grass roofs everywhere. It's mainly the older houses that have this type of insulation but the occasional new-build has it too.

It leads to some funny sights too - a sheep grazing on the roof of a low-lying house, or someone mowing the roof-top lawn on one of the biggest hotels in the Faroes. Even for me, a local, that looked strange. I wonder what tourists think.

Pretty as these roofs are, they're not as effective as modern-day insulation - or as practical.

Growing grass on our roofs is how we Faroese have kept warm for centuries, but keeping warm is not a challenge limited to the far North. With rising energy bills and colder winters it's a challenge that faces everyone from the Faroes, to Britain, to all of Europe and beyond.

The best way to preserve heat and save money is by having enough loft insulation - ideally 27 cm. If you don't have any insulation at all you could expect to save around £145 a year by adding those few centimetres. It costs around £250 to have installed so should pay for itself in no time.

Worth a thought, eh?
 
And while you're at it please check out Friends of the Earth's campaign for the Government to warm up the coldest homes. Thank you.

Rannva Danielsen, Intern - Communications & Media team