New to the American market, Navien tankless water heaters sound good. Since all the heat is utilized efficiently, very little waste heat is exhausted (as with gas water heaters), and the exhaust pipe can safely be made of PVC pipe.
The Intelligent Project is an Indiana company focusing on the consumer's use of energy. When consumers have feedback mechanisms showing:
People driving a Prius, for example, use less gas because they see right on the screen how their driving affects gas usage.
"If we can save 5% of energy in the home throughout the U.S., we probably don't need to build any new coal-fired power plants for the next 20 years," said Purdue Professor Richard Feinberg, chare of the Intelligent Project's research advisory board.
Naturally, one of the company's key goals is to get a Smart Grid established for the United States. Smart Grid technology and its related Smart meters will be key in helping utilities balance demand, reduce expensive peak power use and provide a better deal for consumers by allowing them to see and respond to real-time pricing information through in-home displays, smart thermostats and appliances.
With 50 states and nearly as many state energy policies, the Smart Grid still seems mired in the realsm of fantasy; let's hope that we can get some traction on this in the new year. In the meantime, consumers who want to track their energy usage can buy a Wattson (but only if you live in these countries, none of which is the U.S.)
Or, get a Kill-a-Watt and track your energy usage by appliance. Keep up on Smart Grid developments at SmartGridNews.com
Was inspired by a Bloomington Herald-Times article last week. Faced with no budget for a library, the 540 citizens of Chrisney, IN just went ahead anyway. See fuller coverage in the Evansville Courier-Press.
"They had no money to build a library, no viable existing buildings or partnerships for a shared storefront library, and their public library district adamantly refused to support capital or operating costs for a new branch." --Bill Brown, project architect on the Chrisney library building, and now Director of the IU Office of Sustainability
The building got land and maintenance commitment donated from the town, a grant from the Indiana Office of Community and Rural Affairs, and $66,000 in matching funds from the citizens of the town. (Remember, there are only 540 citizens in the town.) The result:
Congratulations to the town of Chrisney, Indiana for their foresight, initiative and innovation.
Image Credit: Denny Simmons, Evansville Courier-Press
Schools, churches, corporations, local governments and seemingly any group that owns a non-residential building can sign up to take the Energy Star Challenge which calls on them to reduce their energy use by 10%. This is a terrific program that also provides the information and tools with which to accomplish the goal, including communication materials to share information and success stories.
The Energy Star Toolkit offers energy monitoring programs and other materials tailored to each type of group;for example the Guide for Congregations provides materials to:
Similarly appropriate materials and resources are provided for schools k-12 and higher education institutions -- from teaching tools, info on how to finance improvements, and guidelines for energy management. Bringing green building techniques to school settings is particularly gratifying because multiple tests have shown that better air quality and daylighting improve student test scores.
See the Energy Star Challenge Case History for Council Rock School District in Newtown, PA and other case histories on the site.
The New York TImes reports that many LEED-certified buildings are not living up to the energy-saving potential promised by their design. The USGBC is going to change certification to require 5 years of energy and water bills in order to keep a building's LEED status. I am feeling pretty confident that our house, built using PassiveHaus principles, will perform outstandingly in terms of energy savings. We'll keep the records to prove it so that, if we do get LEED certification, in five years we won't have to give it back. The Farmer's Almanac predicts numbing cold this winter. I say, "bring it on".
The Bloomington (IN) Herald-Times featured an article yesterday about greening older homes. It's great to see that the same historic preservationists that have kept so many of our treasured older buildings from being destroyed are now incorporating energy efficient practices into their work.
Since its inception in 1993 publicity around the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) has largely focused on new construction, in an attempt to stop shoddy and energy-wasting building practices before they begin. But the USGBC hasn't totally ignored the greening of existing homes.
The USGBC recently joined forces with the American Society of Interior Designers’ (ASID) Foundation to create REGREEN, which provides best
practice guidelines and targeted educational resources for sustainable
residential improvement projects. On the REGREEN website you'll find terrific resources and case studies to help guide renovation efforts, including a Deep Energy Retrofit Case Study.
Many older homes can be made energy-efficient and, if the house is not completely ruined, this is always preferable to tearing down an existing home and replacing it with a new one. Preservationists might want to have a look at the deep green renovation of a 1915 Craftsman bungalow recently completed by the founder of USGBC, David Gottfried, whose home is rated LEED Platinum.
In the same spirit, LEED for Homes awards additional rating points for building a new house where another house once stood, and building it near essential services to minimize driving.
The building of our own green home was greatly enhanced because we chose to work with a seasoned contractor with a long history of restoring older homes, the Golden Hands Construction company, owned by Chris Sturbaum. In short, preservationists and green builders/renovators are on the same team, and are beginning to work together. That's good news for all of us.
An article in the New York Times today reports that cool roofs (white roofs) cost only 15% more than their dark counterparts, while substantially lowering electricity bills on an ongoing basis.
The Cool Roof Rating Council can help homeowners and contractors find materials that provide the radiative properties necessary to lower their energy bills and combat global warming.
Reminding us that 7% of energy use is from lighting, and that 40% of all energy use is from the buildings in which we live and work, the Obama administration issued new standards for efficiency in lighting used in commercial and residential buildings.
Particularly exciting to me is the funding provided for research into solid-state lighting. Solid-state, or LED lighting, has shown the greatest promise in cutting energy use, but its adoption has been very slow due to the cost of LED bulbs. This will really help accelarate adoption of the technology.
Image from Inhabitat.com
