The Reincarnated McMansion Project will involve dismantling an existing house and rebuilding it into a triplex, using the old bricks to make new self-heating and cooling walls.

The chosen home owner will receive $200,000 worth of subsidies and sponsorship to help transform their McMansion into a green home. The project will take at least a year to complete.

Project conceiver Mat Gillois said there were many homes in the Macarthur region that could benefit from a redesign.

He said more than 60 tonnes of carbon dioxide was used to build a large brick-veneer home.

``To make something like a brick uses quite a lot of energy,'' he said. ``Over a 10-year period the amount of energy that your average home uses for heating and cooling and showers equal to that 60 tonnes.

``If you can design a house that heats itself and cools itself through design, long-term you're reducing drastically the energy the house needs to be comfortable for the occupants.''

Mr Gillois came up with the idea when he found the design strategies used to build his friend's house differed from what he had learned in his architecture studies.

Architect Tone Wheeler, who designed last year's ``green'' Big Brother house, said the project would ``revolutionise what people think about new houses''.

He said the strategy would reduce the carbon footprint of a new home by 85 per cent.

``Every single piece in it will be re-used, not for what they were originally used for,'' he said. ``All the original outside will be inside.''

Mr Gillois said the team would soon begin their search for the ideal home for the project.

Nominate your McMansion: reincarnatedmcmansion.com