With utilities bills on the rise, this family leapt at the chance to live in a home that showcases sustainability, without sacrificing comfort or style. For one Sydney family, it's already a reality, writes Elizabeth Wilson.

Science-fiction images of the house of the future have been tantalising us since the 1960s. It's usually a place of intergalactic glamour, a capsule nesting on a tower that stretches into space, inhabited by people with a penchant for clinging bodysuits. But the reality, it turns out, is much more recognisable and down to earth. The real house of tomorrow is all about the future of our planet rather than a far-off galaxy.

For the past year, an experiment has been unfolding in the Sydney suburb of Newington, where Michael Adams, his partner, Clare Joyce, and their daughter, Ava, five, have been living in a home devised as a test model for the future. The two-storey townhouse has been fitted out with cutting-edge technologies, eco-conscious materials and six-star appliances designed to slash greenhouse-gas emissions and water use. The couple's mission? To showcase the future of household energy efficiency and sustainability.

The family has been living rent-free in the so-called Smart Home, a joint experiment by Ausgrid (formerly Energy Australia) and Sydney Water, in exchange for trialling the home's energy-saving gizmos and having their energy consumption monitored for all to see. Along the way, Michael and Clare have been writing an entertaining blog. So, what's it like to live in the future?

"Well, we're not flying around like the Jetsons," says Clare. "It's not space-age looking or anything like that. It's a home that combines energy efficiency with beautiful, contemporary design. Everything here is geared to cutting down our carbon footprint."

When Clare, Michael and Ava were chosen from a list of 160 families to take part in this year-long experiment, they were readier than most to take up the challenge. "It coincided with a decision we had made in 2010 to live a different life," says Clare. They had already pledged their commitment to shop and eat in an eco-friendly way, replacing supermarket shopping with trips to organic and farmers' markets. And they vowed to turn off lights and stand-by power, turn off taps and examine their power bills carefully. In short, they were just the sort of conscientious residents required to demonstrate the potential of the Smart Home.

"We'd done some research into sustainability and we were wanting to translate that knowledge to our daily lives," says Clare. "When the Smart Home came along, it was an opportunity to live a much smarter, greener, more sustainable life. We couldn't do that in our rented, crumbling terrace in [Sydney's] Annandale, which was facing the wrong way, had an old wood-fuelled heater and was an energy-guzzler."

The Smart Home, by contrast, generates its own energy though a combination of solar power and an ingenious BlueGen ceramic fuel cell that converts natural gas into electricity. There are two sources of solar power fitted at the house – a solar pergola (with a roof formed by solar panels) and rooftop photovoltaic panels. Electricity generated during the day is stored in a battery system for use at night.

"In our old house, we were using 60kWh [kilowatt hours] of power per day. Here, we're using an average of just 9.9kWh per day," says Michael. "We're generating some 30.5kWh per day from the BlueGen and solar panels combined, far more than we consume. The excess electricity we generate is going back into the grid."

The house also boasts a washing machine that uses recycled (and treated) water, a six-star heat-pump clothes dryer, a heat-exchange air-cooling system, state-of-the-art LED lighting, an LED television and a clever device that will automatically turn off all stand-by power in the living room if it detects that the electrical equipment is not in use.

All furnishings in the house are either recycled or made from sustainable resources. In the kitchen, for example, Dalchoc rubber flooring from Dalsouple is made from recycled tyres, the island benchtop and splashbacks are recycled glass and the stools are recycled cork. Floor-to-ceiling storage cupboards are faced with a compressed cardboard laminate. The living/dining area features a sleek bamboo table, dining chairs made from recycled car batteries and revamped armchairs snaffled from a tip. In the bathroom, a slow-flow showerhead delivers a comfortable wash that consumes one-third as much water as an average shower, while a wall-mounted timer keeps languorous soaking sessions in check. Moving outside, the native garden is equally water-wise, designed to survive on rainfall alone.

"Living here has really focused our thoughts on the environmental and energy issues involved in every aspect of our daily lives," says Michael, as the family nears the end of this unique smart-living experience. "It's made us realise that you make a difference by combining the best appliances with an efficient, sensible approach to using energy."

Gadgets and gizmos

The key to smart living, according to Michael and Clare, is to combine behavioural change with the best appliances. Here are the essentials used in the Smart Home:
Electrolux ETM4200SC refrigerator
Bosch HBA58T650A oven
Fisher & Paykel Izona CookSurface cooktop
Bosch SMU65M15AU dishwasher
Samsung Timesaver microwave
Tefal Privilege TT6060 toaster
Miele Novotronic W1611 washing machine
Bosch Eco Logixx heat-pump clothes dryer
Braemar SH25 and SH18 ducted-gas space heaters
Seeley Climate Wizard evaporative cooling system

Living smart

Here's a snapshot of what's inside the Smart Home:
The BlueGen ceramic fuel cell converts natural gas into electricity, generating 30kWh of power per day at a costof $3.50 daily. "It's my favourite gizmo because it's so revolutionary in terms of energy provision," says Michael. "It's powering the entire house and recharging the car."

The solar pergola has a roof formed by five photovoltaic panels. Together with the panels on the main roof, it generates 3kWh of energy per day.

A low-flow showerhead: "It releases nine litres per minute, instead of 27 litres per minute for a regular showerhead," says Michael.

"The shower monitor is a great, cheap way to alter your showering habits," says Clare.

The Climate Wizard cooling system uses only 10 per cent as much electricity as a normal reverse-cycle airconditioning unit but guzzles water. "During the heatwave in summer, we used 1200 litres of recycled water in one week to operate it," says Clare. "It's hard to weigh up the energy efficiency versus the water efficiency. It doesn't operate at its best in Sydney's humidity, but would work better in a hot, dry climate like Perth's."

The Mitsubishi i-MieV is whisper-quiet, "like some sort of stealth vehicle," jokes Michael. At the moment he and Clare are the only private users in Australia but the car will be available to the public later this year.