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An architect I know tells me that one of the first questions he gets from prospective house clients is: Will it be sustainable? By that, they might mean merely: Given the high price of home heating and cooling, will the house be energy-efficient?

That is certainly a valid concern these days, so it's hardly surprising to find people in the new-house market asking about such matters right up front.

But for an increasing number of North American housing customers, questions about sustainability go deeper than the monthly hydro bill.

They want to know about the fit of the house into the larger environment -- how much damage building the thing will cause, for example, or how natural light can be incorporated into the design.

They are interested in systems for capturing and recycling rainwater and "grey water" (from sinks and showers), and how low-emission paints and varnishes, carpeting and floor coverings can be put to work to ensure good air quality.

People with such queries, and everyone interested in what's possible in new, environmentally friendly residential design, should surely read The Green House: New Directions in Sustainable Architecture by Alanna Stang and Christopher Hawthorne (Princeton Architectural Press, $54.95). And for those who still think "sustainability" means living in a contraption of tubes and tanks, or a yurt, this book shows just how convenient (and classy) green living can be.

The knowledgeable authors -- Ms. Stang is a widely published architectural journalist and Mr. Hawthorne is architecture critic for the Los Angeles Times -- have gathered their 29 examples from a wide variety of places (cities, suburbs) and climatic zones (from the Atlantic shoreline of Nova Scotia to the mountains of Switzerland), which goes to show, contrary to a popular myth, that a house both handsome and healthy can be built somewhere other than sunny Southern California.

The coastal Nova Scotia house, by Halifax architect Brian MacKay-Lyons, employs a number of strategies meant to lighten the load of the house on the environment. These include passive solar collection and in-floor radiant heating, and the use of locally available building materials.

The long, thin shape opens generously toward the water, but the double-height steel-framed windows (for passive solar) are braced against exposure to the harsh prevailing winds. There are no overhangs, which gives the building an appearance that is compact and streamlined without seeming austere.

"With a regular if unpredictable freeze-thaw cycle, thanks to the warm gulf-stream air that runs through here," the architect explains, "overhangs create leaks." The result is a house that both looks and really is tight, bright and well-matched to its rugged environment.

Sensible energy use is, of course, a concern to all the designers represented in The Green House, though a beautiful six-storey townhouse in the Tribeca neighbourhood of New York City provides an especially striking instance of sustainable heating and cooling.

To provide for the energy needs of this building, architect John Petrarca sank a geothermal heat pump about 1,100 feet into the ground (that's nearly the height of the Empire State Building) where the temperature is a steady 13 C all the time.

This zero-polluting technology enabled Mr. Petrarca to slash the energy consumption of the house by 75 per cent.

In addition, he lessened the environmental impact of the construction by making sure all materials, inside and out, were non-toxic, and by pouring the concrete walls into Styrofoam forms that stayed put on the site. (Wood forms are typically discarded.)

The most thoroughgoing green structure in this book, however, is surely California designer Michelle Kaufmann's award-winning Glide House.

Into this prefab house -- "designed for clean, simple living in collaboration with nature," says the architect -- Ms. Kaufmann has piled almost every sustainable feature on the contemporary shelf. Its sliding south-facing wall of glass and louvered screens is engineered to capture sunshine and amplify breezes with maximum effectiveness.

The flooring is bamboo, an abundant, readily renewable resource, while carpet tiles are made from recycled polyester and nylon. Countertops have been fashioned from recycled newspaper and granite ash.

And the whole roof is designed to be kitted out with photovoltaic cells for electricity supply, if you really do want to go the whole nine yards and move off the grid.

While Ms. Kaufmann's Glide House is appealing for many reasons -- it's a wonderful example of the durable, romantic impulse in American architecture to get back to basics -- most people, however environmentally conscientious, will not want to go that distance. For them, The Green House offers a handy, suggestive guide to new techniques and technologies that responsibly serve our needs for comfortable living in a world of shrinking resources.

If you're still interested in green living and happen to be travelling in the United States this winter or spring, you may want to see the show called "The Green House: New Directions in Sustainable Architecture and Design," at the National Building Museum in Washington, D.C., until June 3.

jmays@globeandmail.com