IT may look like an ordinary house, but inside it is fitted with some extraordinary technology.

An eco house was unveiled yesterday giving people an insight into the planned 5,000 home eco settlement, in north west Bicester.

Everything in the demonstration building has been made from recycled materials, sustainable resources or can be recycled.

Its internal workings are completely different to a regular home and it will be carbon neutral.

Ian Inshaw, chairman of P3Eco Bicester, which is behind the eco town, reckons by using all the green technology household electricity bills would be reduced by about 70 per cent.

He said: “The demonstration house was designed to show the technology in the houses, it is not a show home.

“Most of the technology will be in every house, but there will be slight variations depending on the size and the nature of the house.

“As more technology appears on the market we will put it in the building.

“Part of the project is to encourage people to change their lifestyle. It’s to get people thinking about it.”

In the house, in Garth Park, off Launton Road, doors and windows have been triple glazed making the property 10 times more air-tight and sound proof than a regular building.

Gone are radiators or electric heaters, instead replaced with a thermostatically controlled mechanical ventilation with heat recovery system, which uses air within the home to heat the property or draws in fresh air from outside to cool the building.

Rainwater is collected underground to be reused in toilets or some kitchen appliances, such as the first rinse in a dishwasher, and bathwater will also be stored and recycled.

It also has five solar panels which have been fed into the national grid, a low energy cooker, dishwasher and washing machine, and low energy LED lighting.

Mr Inshaw could not say how much the new eco homes would cost, but said they would have to be competitively priced.

He said: “There is a myth these eco houses cost a lot of money, but in reality the construction industry is going to have to build homes like this in the future and it has got to learn how to do it.

“If you are trying to produce some as marketable then you’ve got to keep the prices low.”

The house opens to the public on Tuesday, May 31, and will open Monday to Friday, from 10am to 4pm.

l Plans for the first phase of the eco town, called an exemplar, are expected to go before Cherwell District Council’s planning committee next month.

If approved work could start on site as soon as the autumn.