Bundling up your house
Posted on | March 12, 2010 | No Comments
I’ve been spending a lot of time thinking about insulation lately. Part of that is because of HOME STAR, which provides incentives for homeowners if they choose to upgrade the insulation in their house, among other things. My explanation of HOME STAR inevitably leads to explaining some of the measures available for incentives, and insulation is one of my favorites.
“But why?”, you say. (Or maybe you don’t, I don’t want to put words in your mouth, ha.) Well consider this: although you can’t see it, using a good amount of insulation and installing it properly is one of the greatest differences between having an energy efficient house and having a drafty, cold, money-pit of a house. Observe:
From the GDC's Green Your Home tool
Now, knowing that you need a lot of insulation is one thing; know what KIND of insulation to get is entirely another. In my diagram above, the pink part of the wall section is pink because I assumed that a lot of people associate that color with Owens Corning’s Pink Panther, aka “The Historical American Emissary of Insulation.” And it’s true that Owens Corning has a lot of insulation products that are useful for homes, including a new product called Foamular, which is a rigid and moisture-resistant exterior insulation. I’ve seen how this stuff is made – at the Owens Corning LEED Gold Manufacturing Plant just outside of Portland, no less – and it’s a heck of a lot easier to use than the old pink fiberglass stuff. No offense to the Pink Panther, of course.
BUT, there are other, perhaps more sustainable options for insulation, ones that use less manufacturing energy or recycled materials, for instance. Lloyd Alter over at Treehugger recently posted his thoughts on the debate between spray polyurethane foam insulation and recycled denim insulation. There are advantages and disadvantages to both, and since Lloyd covered them already, I won’t repeat him. But, depending on what the application is, you might find the fact that the spray foam is easy to install and covers up any gaps appealing; or, you may want to avoid VOCs and use the recycled denim, which helps eliminate material from the waste stream.
Obviously, I am not paid to endorse any product here at the GDC, nor do I personally have a preference as to what people use – perhaps one day when I buy a house, I will decide! In the meantime, I DO encourage people who have homes and the money to renovate to check out the insulation in their homes and maybe consider upgrading … in almost every climate zone in the country, it will help you save energy, which will help you save money. Hooray for saving money! 
Tags: building > energy > home > homes > housing > insulation > materials > money > Renovation > saving > waste
Living on a giant crusty earthen raft
Posted on | March 4, 2010 | 1 Comment
So, there’s been a lot of earthquakes lately. Haiti back in January; Chile, last weekend; Japan, back in February; California, constantly for about the past month; and Taiwan yesterday. I know many scientists will say “these events are not related”, but, as I reminded my friends yesterday, people act like we don’t live on a giant crusty earthen raft that’s simply floating on one mass of molten magma. And just to clarify: we DO live ON the earth’s crust, which simply floats on a layer of super-hot molten magma, which surrounds an even hotter core at the center of the Earth. It’s easy to forget that this is science, not magic, especially when many people try to dilute or flat out deny other aspects of what we know about the world, like global climate change or evolution.
But I digress. I firmly believe that the Earth is one mega-giant geophysical system and so I’m predisposed to think that movement in the Earth’s crust in one area is likely to affect movement in the crust in another area. Maybe this is the case, maybe not. But, like it or not, there are fault lines all over this planet, and a very good number of us live in an area that would be affected by seismic activity. Including myself, living in the Pacific Northwest, with the Cascadia subduction zone, where “the seismic clock is ticking.”
Which is why I’ve finally decided to take the creation of my earthquake kit very seriously. Observe:
The beginnings of my earthquake kit - old clothes and lots of coffee
Having never put together an earthquake kit before (despite living in Los Angeles for two years), I looked up how to make a proper preparedness kit on the internets. I found one, appropriately, on the site for the San Francisco Chronicle’s SFGate. It includes a lot of head-scratching items, like a small fire extinguisher and sunglasses, but for the most part it is all super valuable stuff that would be useful in the event of a catastrophic earthquake.
*I*, on the other hand, am preparing a bag that would in theory allow me to survive for a day or so trapped underground OR allow me to get out, get on my bike, and go find other people. It will include important stuff like a super-cool solar-powered/hand-crank radio and LED flashlight, as well as a first aid kit, rain gear, a warm jacket, matches and extra food. I have, however, taken some liberties from the SFGate site – for instance, they say to include bleach, which I get, but I’m trying to come up with something portable, thus the little bleach pen (good in a pinch, literally). Also note the copious amounts of coffee; hey, I have a portable French Press, might as well put it to good use!
All in all, my earthquake kit is stocked with things I have but don’t use on a regular basis, but still don’t want to get rid of. I’m finding that this is not only a great way to get prepared for an earthquake but also an in-house recycling exercise. Being aware of how you use and perhaps waste products in your home is as integral to living more lightly on the earth as realizing that you live on a giant rock that is subjected to forces of geophysics beyond our control.
Do you have any suggestions for putting together an earthquake preparedness kit? Post them here!
Tags: building > earth > home > homes > housing > recycling > reuse > science > sustainable > waste
HOME STAR: This is kind of a big deal
Posted on | February 26, 2010 | 1 Comment
There are several energy and climate bills floating around in the Congress right now, including the Kerry/Boxer (or Kerry/Graham/Lieberman) Clean Energy Jobs and American Power Act (which has been in the works since – but not because – I thanked them here) ; the Bingaman/Murkowski American Clean Energy Leadership Act, or ACELA; the Cantwell/Collins CLEAR Act; and probably the most comprehensive energy and climate bill on the docket right now, the Waxman/Markey Bill in the House. All of these, in so far as I can tell, are floating around in some legislative ether that I don’t understand but usually attribute to our Congress’ inability to do anything truly useful.
Well, that may soon change, at least a little bit. Enter the HOME STAR Jobs Bill. HOME STAR provides two paths for consumers to save energy in their homes (from their Web site):
- The Silver Star prescriptive path provides a near-term incentive for specific energy saving investments that is simple to administer and easily introduced into the existing marketplace. Homeowners receive between $1,000 and $1,500 for each measure installed in the home, or $250 per appliance, with a benefit not exceeding $3,000 or at least 50% of total project costs (whichever is less). Covered measures include air sealing; attic, wall, and crawl space insulation; duct sealing or replacement; and replacement of existing windows and doors, furnaces, air conditioners, heat pumps, water heaters and appliances with high-efficiency models. The legislation will utilize existing standards for qualifying products at a level sufficient to significantly increase consumer demand for highly energy efficient building materials and mechanical systems. SILVER STAR improvements may be implemented by any appropriately licensed and insured contractor, but all participating contractors will receive information about opportunities for accreditation and training programs.
- The Gold Star performance path offers an incentive to households that choose to conduct a comprehensive energy audit and then implement a variety of measures that are designed together to provide greater total returns in energy savings. This performance path represents the future of home efficiency: state-of-the-art building science is used to identify problems, present solutions and deliver verifiable energy savings, generating confidence among homeowners and investors alike. This technology-neutral approach is based on performance, not specific products, so market forces will direct funds to solutions that achieve the best results. A certified professional with accreditation from the Building Performance Institute (BPI), the Residential Energy Services Network (RESNET) or an approved equivalent conducts an energy audit before work begins, and a test-out when the performance retrofit is complete. Consumers receive $3,000 for modeled savings of 20%, plus an additional $1,500 incentive for each additional 5% of modeled energy savings, with incentives not to exceed 50% of project costs. Contractors implementing the GOLD STAR performance path must be BPI accredited.
What this means is that, essentially, if this legislation passes, millions of people will very quickly have several options available to them by which they can implement energy-saving measures in their homes by actions as simple as upgrading appliances or by doing an all-out renovation. The bill primarily hopes to quickly create as many jobs as possible, while providing energy efficiency on a massive scale, which not only will ease the burden on our aging energy infrastructure, it will ultimately reduce carbon emissions. (Both of which, incidentally, were the goals when I started this Web site.) Additionally, anyone wishing to implement these measures will have financing options available to them that are guaranteed through the provisions of the bill.
Pretty neat, eh? Now we just need to hope that the legislation gets passed! If you’d like to learn more about HOME STAR, visit their Web site here. If you’d like to join the coalition supporting it, visit the Efficiency First Web site to sign up and find out how you can contact your legislators to voice your support. Even if you don’t own your own home or aren’t in a position to change your living situation to make it more efficient, I think we can all agree that adding a couple hundred thousand jobs during a recession to a very depressed construction market is a good idea, and making several million homes more efficient is an even better idea. So CHECK IT OUT!!!
Tags: building > carbon > design > economy > efficient > emissions > energy > home > homes > housing > jobs > politics > Renovation > saving
Want to get a home energy rating?
Posted on | February 23, 2010 | 1 Comment
…Well if so, let me know, because I’m at a conference with several hundred home energy raters this week!
First of all, you may want to know what a “home energy rating” consists of. The funny thing is, there’s actually LOTS of home energy ratings. There’s the HERS, which is given by ResNet, which is the group hosting the conference I’m attending this week; there’s a BPI rating; there’s the ENERGY STAR designation; there’s the LEED for Homes; there’s the NAHB Green Home Standard; and I’m pretty sure there’s a few that I’m forgetting.
An example of a HERS score: image courtesy of ResNet
Each of these rating systems use a set of standards that are either administered during the construction or remodeling of the home, or they are checked after the home is completed. To adhere to these strict standards, your home needs to have properly installed insulation, tight construction (so that your home doesn’t leak too much air), an air/moisture barrier (again with the leakage), properly sealed ducts, and it wouldn’t hurt to have good windows, weatherstripping, very efficient HVAC equipment, and … basically your home should be a well-constructed, high-performance house.
I would regale you with the details of the various sessions that I’ve been attending but I can almost guarantee that you would get bored and fall asleep reading. I’ve been having a hard time staying awake myself, which I attribute to the warmth of the rooms and the fact that I’m operating three hours ahead of my home time zone. Nevertheless, it’s an incredibly informative conference and I’m getting to meet a lot of very knowledgeable people who are working to help homeowners save energy.
Now, back to watching the Olympics!
Tags: building > efficient > energy > home > homes > housing > reduce > saving
Living in Los Angeles Without a Car
Posted on | February 12, 2010 | No Comments
It seems like a very far away experience for me, now that I’ve been living in Portland for nearly 9 months (aka the sky has been Pantone Warm Grey since October), but before my current situation I was living in Los Angeles for grad school. And, as you might have picked up from the title of this post, I was living there without a car.
Just to be clear, YES, I lived in Los Angeles for two years without a car.
And I did so intentionally. Before I left the Midwest, I sold my beloved Volkswagen GTI, bought a bike, and moved to LA car-less. I did the math – not having a car in LA for two years would save me an estimated $10,000, and when you’re living on a shoe-string budget and trying to put yourself through graduate school, every little bit counts. And I’ve always been a big fan of public transportation and bikes, and since you can bike almost year-round in LA, I figured I would do just that. Besides, I told people – I wanted to prove that it could be done. I wanted to put the system to the test and see if my life was severely impacted by not having a car, in one of the most car-obsessed cities in America.
So how did I do? …You might be wondering. Well, would it surprise you to know that this blog-happy cyclist started a blog specifically about my experiences in LA while car-less? It’s called, ahem: Living in Los Angeles Without A Car. Original, no? I called it LILAWAC for short, because that’s the abbreviation, and because it sounds cute. Please feel free to have a look if you are interested in hearing more about the authentic LA car-free experience, from myself and a few other contributors … although I stopped posting well over a year ago (this little thing called a “graduate thesis” got in my way), it’s still up and public, and every once in a while I get an odd comment on there.
This bike got me around Los Angeles for two years!
Sooo… If you are moving to LA, or just visiting, and you’d like to try and do it car-free and carefree (ha), here’s a crash course for you (ha ha, crash course):
- Bookmark your LA Metro Bus and Rail Trip Planner. Even after a year of living there, I’d occasionally find a quicker way to go from point A to point B using this widget. Check out my tips for riding the bus here.
- When possible, take the DASH buses. They are awesome and only cost 25 cents. Plus, they take pennies!
- Oh and don’t forget that Los Angeles isn’t the only city in the Southland… keep an eye out for Santa Monica’s Big Blue Bus or the Culver City green buses, in case there are some gaps in your public transportation route.
- Trying to get from LAX Airport to anywhere in Los Angeles is daunting, but not impossible. That is what the LAX Flyaway is for.
- Car sharing, on the other hand, is nearly impossible in LA. At least, I found it troubling.
- If you’d rather go by two wheels instead of Metro, keep in mind these points:
- Riding on the sidewalk is not only irritating, it is illegal.
- Ride in the street when there’s not a bike lane, and when in doubt, take the lane. Yes, LA drivers are crazy, and yes, it’s scary riding on the same road with them. But if you try to squish yourself in between a lane and the parked cars on the side of the road, you put yourself at a much greater risk of getting sideswiped or doored … better to just be IN the lane. Very few drivers will straight out mow a cyclist down if you are in front of them. (At least that’s what I tell myself so I can sleep at night.)
- Cycling in LA can be tricky, but it can also be awesome.
Image courtesy of the Laist.com - that's me!
Now another thing you should know is, although I may be the only one with a Blogspot LILAWAC, I’m certainly not the only one who ever lived in LA without a car. In part because of my blog, I was approached by a very nice woman named Diane who decided to put together an exhibit of all our experiences. She’s a photographer by trade so the exhibit was sort of a pictoral essay, a series of short testimonials by 100 people like me, all of whom went car-less for various reasons. One of my quotes even made it into the exhibit (photo above).
I hear the exhibit is still making its rounds about Los Angeles! And although I am not still making my rounds about LA, and yes, I do now have a car (although one can hardly call it a big expense), I still look back on LILAWAC with fondness. I wish I could bequeath my old blog to some other car-less buddies still in the Southland who wouldn’t mind sharing their experiences for the benefit of all Angelenos. In fact, if you’re interested in being the face of LILAWAC for the new decade, leave me a comment! Just remember, car-bound people need not apply
Unplug, or the Polar Bear Gets it
Posted on | February 5, 2010 | No Comments
AKA, the Greenlite at Dartmouth University energy saving program. First, go to Greenlite’s home page here.
What do you see? Do you see a happy polar bear, playing with a butterfly?
Perhaps he’s taking a nap next to his “friends”, the baby seal and the baby polar bear…
Or, maybe you see a polar bear that’s running… you see, the sun came out and it started to melt the ice underneath the polar bear’s feet. He needs to get somewhere, and fast!
What these animations are depicting, if you were perceptive enough to figure out from the dashboard on the left-hand side of the page, is real-time energy usage on the campus of Dartmouth University. Unlike many other institutions, which have mandated efficiency programs and/or building goals that were set by the university or the government, Dartmouth sought to reduce energy consumption in their dorms – solely through behavioral changes – by 15%. From their Web site:
Launched on April 24, 2008, the goal of the program is to change behavior by providing energy information in meaningful and compelling ways. … We encourage students to change the way they use energy in their daily lives by monitoring and displaying information about the resources students have control over, such as plug loads for electricity, heat and water use. We hope to help students understand the larger impacts of their actions and develop tools and approaches to energy conservation that can carry over into their everyday lives.
This program at Dartmouth is innovative, educational, interactive, and fun. It’s also an example of a hybrid energy efficiency system that exists in very few places in the United States – it’s a behavior modification program that relies on a building monitoring system for real-time data. The polar bear reacts to the energy load on the building at any given time, and the students can therefore react to the amount of energy they are using immediately. And it’s not presented in a boring way, either … it’s an animation of a polar bear that lives a happy life or dies based on the energy consumption by the students at Dartmouth.
And by all accounts, it’s been a great success.
This is a good example of an innovative system that buildings might want to employ in the future to encourage occupants to save energy. The polar bear may not work in all circles, but I, for one, do not want to see any majestic animals suffer because of climate change, so this would have worked on me like a charm.
Kudos to the students at Dartmouth for thinking outside the box to achieve massive energy savings on their campus!
Tags: behavior > building > efficient > energy > saving > science
Q: What’s wee, made of straw bale, and awesome?
Posted on | February 3, 2010 | 3 Comments
A: The ModCell Straw-Bale Pre-Fab home!
Image courtesy of Inhabitat
File this under “better late than never”… I just learned about this house and knew I had to talk about it here because it embodies many of the things that I love in one tidy, very livable package. Observe:
- It’s a house, which is great, since I love house design;
- It’s made of straw bales, which are sustainable, renewable, AND energy efficient with proper installation;
- It’s pre-fab, which is super cool because pre-fabricated designs cut down on job site waste and allow for easier manufacturing recycling;
- It’s small, and compact, and cute, which means it’s got a lower carbon footprint (although the cuteness doesn’t contribute to that, it’s just a bonus);
- AND it meets PassivHaus standards, which is about as close as you can get to a net-zero energy house.
I mean, this is pretty awesome, right? And it’s a good looking little house. The only problem I’m seeing is that ModCell is a UK company which makes it nearly impossible to build the cute goodness in your pre-selected plot, if you live in the United States, that is. Which is not to say that you couldn’t send the cuteness over on a giant cargo ship, it’s just that the adorable-ness becomes slightly less so when you realize how much fuel you had to use getting it States-side (think of how much carbon you burn when you get a on a plane to take a short flight, then multiply that by like, oh, 10,000*).
*(I’m exaggerating, I don’t actually know what kind of carbon footprint a trip on a cargo ship would yield. I have to believe it’s bigger than having it built down the street, though).
So, here’s to hoping that ModCell partners up with an American manufacturer to begin more “local” production of it’s pre-fab wonder so that some of us can get our hands on this wee, energy-efficient, awesomeness.
Here's another photo of it because it's cool; image courtesy of Inhabitat
Tags: awesome > carbon > design > efficient > emissions > energy > home > homes > housing > materials > passive > passivhaus > pre-fab > recycling > renewable
America’s Greenest Building Code
Posted on | January 20, 2010 | No Comments
Last week, the California Building Standards Commission unanimously adopted the first-in-the-nation mandatory Green Building Standards Code, also known as “CALGREEN”. The new standards take effect starting January 1, 2011 and will require all new buildings in the state to be more energy efficient and environmentally responsible. The new CALGREEN code will require:
- a 20 percent mandatory reduction in indoor water use, with voluntary goal standards for 30, 35 and 40 percent reductions;
- Separate water meters for nonresidential buildings’ indoor and outdoor water use, with a requirement for moisture-sensing irrigation systems for larger landscape projects;
- Requiring diversion of 50 percent of construction waste from landfills, increasing voluntarily to 65 and 75 percent for new homes and 80 percent for commercial projects;
- Mandatory inspections of energy systems (i.e. heat furnace, air conditioner, mechanical equipment) for nonresidential buildings over 10,000 square feet to ensure that all are working at their maximum capacity according to their design efficiencies;
- Requiring low-pollutant emitting interior finish materials such as paints, carpet, vinyl flooring and particle board.
All of this and more information about CALGREEN can be found here.
So what does this mean for the average homeowner? Well, if you live in California, you may start to see the changes immediately, especially if you are building or planning on buying a house in the next few years, as this new code will affect all new buildings. Although on the other hand, the changes may not be as noticeable, since California has been at the forefront of energy efficient design for many years, so this code is more like an incremental step rather than a big jump.
Even gas stations in California are designed sustainably: The LEED Certified BP Helios House in LA
Now, if you don’t live in California, you should still pay attention, because you may not be off the hook: the CALGREEN is the first green building standard in the nation, but it won’t be the last. There are many states that are not too far behind California in discussing adjustments to their state building codes to make buildings more energy efficient, and those changes to the code might be coming as soon as this year. States like New York, Minnesota, Florida and Colorado are no strangers to green building guidelines, while Wisconsin, Oregon and Washington have energy efficiency programs in place already. California has many challenges facing it right now – its crazy budget problems, its constitution, and various other calamities notwithstanding – but it has always been good at leading the pack with regards to energy efficiency. The CALGREEN program will test the system, and if it works, it will be a great model for the rest of the country.
Of course, you could just get ahead of the curve and start greening your own home without any codes or lawmakers telling you to do so…
Tags: architecture > building > code > design > efficient > energy > home > housing > materials > politics > Renovation > sustainable
Apparently I’m not the only one who left California for Oregon
Posted on | January 10, 2010 | No Comments
Speaking of El Niño, scientists think that might be a factor in why San Francisco’s famous sea lions have abandoned Pier 39 and maybe, just maybe, headed up to the Oregon coast for a “vacation”. On October 23, 2009, over 1,700 sea lions were counted at their regular hang out (just down the dock from Bubba Gump shrimp, if I remember correctly) but by Thanksgiving, fewer than two dozen of them remained.
Meanwhile, between Yachats and Florence, Oregon, sea lions started showing up in groups so large that no one remembers a population that size.
"Sea lions, identify yourself!" (Image courtesy of OregonLive.com)
So what’s the deal, seal? Are these the Pier 39 sea lions or is this just a remarkable coincidence? According to Bruce Mate, director of the Marine Mammal Institute at Oregon State University’s Hatfield Marine Science Center in Newport,
California sea lions always cruise through Oregon waters in search of food … Typically they start to arrive in late summer, peak in October, then move on to waters off Washington and British Columbia. But with small, schooling bait fish such as anchovies and sardines abundant off Oregon at the moment, Mate says, the ravenous Californians may simply have selected to stay.
Or, maybe, like a lot of people, they saw the budget problems that California’s been having and they decided to bail before they got furloughed. I can identify with this reasoning
Why cold weather does not equal global “cooling”
Posted on | January 8, 2010 | No Comments
Image courtesy of Dot Earth (NY Times)
This graph is from the NY Times Dot Earth blog written by Andrew C. Revkin. Mr. Revkin mentioned a few days ago that while, yes, it is pretty darn cold out there, this current activity is not a result of the Earth’s warming, nor is it an indication that the Earth is cooling. It’s more like an extreme result of the natural cycle of Arctic oscillation, much like the El Nino and La Nina cycles of the Pacific Ocean. The tiny blue dot in the lower right-hand corner of the graph, right above the “2010″, is showing a phenomenal plunge of atmospheric pressure in the Arctic in December, almost taking it off the chart, and bringing it to a level lower than anything since at least 1950. It’s easy to forget that our atmosphere operates in cycles, or waves, and that great swaths of pressure and weather swirl around the globe as they interact with the turning of the Earth on its axis, the heat sink of the oceans and the heat islands on land. But, Mr. Revkin points out:
Overall, federal forecasters have said that the warming influence of a persistent El Niño warming of the tropical Pacific Ocean is likely to be a bigger driver of conditions through the full course of this winter. When it’s freezing where you sit, it’s hard to keep in mind that it may be extraordinarily warm elsewhere, as Joe Romm pointed out today.
In other words, winter is winter, it’s just REALLY WINTER-Y. Nevertheless, I do wonder what kind of weather pattern alterations we’ll start to see as the atmosphere continues to absorb greenhouse gas emissions and the global temperature increases. Guess we’ll find out soon enough.
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