Scott Adams On the Difficulty of Building a 'Green' Home

An anonymous reader writes "Scott Adams built himself a new house with the goal of making it as 'green' as possible, and detailed his experience for those interested in following in his missteps. Quoting: '... So the architect — and later your building engineer, too — each asks you to sign a document saying you won't sue them when beavers eat a load-bearing wall and your entire family is crushed by forest debris. You make the mistake of mentioning this arrangement to your family, and they leave you. But you are not deterred because you're saving the planet, damn it. You'll get a new family. A greener one. Your next hurdle is the local planning commission. They like to approve things that are similar to things they've approved before. To do otherwise is to risk unemployment. And the neighbors don't want to live next to a house that looks like a compost pile. But let's say, for the sake of this fascinating story, that everyone in the planning commission is heavily medicated with medical marijuana and they approve your project over the objections of all of your neighbors, except for the beavers, who are suspiciously flexible. Now you need a contractor who is willing to risk his career to build this cutting-edge structure. Good luck with that.'"

Comments

It's an old quote...

[alexschmidt]

"Pioneers usually end up with arrows in their backs" I wish you all the best.

Re:It's an old quote...

[nacturation]

"Pioneers usually end up with arrows in their backs"

That was pretty much his conclusion too. Among other amusing quotes:

In my defense, the price of your future photovoltaic system will never come down unless idiots like me pay too much today. You're welcome.

Re:It's an old quote...

[Attila Dimedici]

Can you explain to me how reducing demand wil drive up prices?

Re:who cares

[Fluffeh]

Aren't there better articles that aren't written by a litigious, unfunny cocksmack who fags up the comics world...

Apparently not. I found it quite humorous. It's nice to see some insight into a process like this from someone with a sense of humor and the ability to laugh at things that make him angry.

Now, go get a nice cup of cocoa, take off those grumpy pants and have a nap. Looks like someone needs a little downtime.

George W Bush did

[dazedNconfuzed]

Seems the much maligned president owned, with little fanfare, a rather "green" home. Passive solar heating, natural cooling, geothermal energy, modest size, rainwater collection, nature preserve, all made for a model environmentalist domicile. (This in contrast to the fast talking "green" showman whose mansion burned 20x the national average.)

Re:George W Bush did

[Anonymous Coward]

Seems the much maligned president owned, with little fanfare, a rather "green" home. Passive solar heating, natural cooling, geothermal energy, modest size, rainwater collection, nature preserve, all made for a model environmentalist domicile. (This in contrast to the fast talking "green" showman whose mansion burned 20x the national average.)

The natural conclusion being that we need to stop listening to the showman and start listening to the guy with the green home and the environmentally unsound public policy?

Re:George W Bush did

[k8to]

Must everything be partisan?

Re:George W Bush did

[Calroth]

(This in contrast to the fast talking "green" showman whose mansion burned 20x the national average.)

http://www.snopes.com/politics/business/gorehome.asp

Re:George W Bush did

[mprinkey]

I've had a geothermal heatpump for almost 10 years. My parents for even longer. They are great, especially in harsh heating climates. We live near Pittsburgh, and they have proved quite affordable. Local contractors have really just started installing them...I had to really look around to find an installer. Most HVAC guys don't want to have to mess with a well-drilling sub and a maybe a backhoe sub to trench from the wells to the house. It is a lot more work, compared to an air-source unit...and far messier! Install an air-source unit, you will get a few holes in your foundation for coolant lines and power to the compressor unit...and then the normal ductwork, air handler inside and the air-source unit sitting outside on a drop-down concrete pad. If the ductwork is in place, it is a 1-2 day job.

With geothermal, (if it is done right) you will have a dozen or more holes in your foundation for the in/out of the loops from each well into a manifold in the basement. You WANT that manifold in case one of the wells dies. You will have trenches from the foundation to the wells...and the wells need to be 10-15 feet apart, so some significant part of your yard will look like hell. Mine took about two weeks to complete because the well driller broke down on the fourth well. And the backhoe operator came *this* close to putting the bucket through my foundation wall. It is a monstrous headache to do a retrofit install, but for new construction, it would be a bit easier. In any case, the cost for the loop install can be a back-breaker. The geothermal units themselves are IMO overpriced too, due to lower production volumes.

Re:George W Bush did

[postbigbang]

The real travesty here is not recapturing all the hot air in Wash DC and heating much of the Eastern Seaboard with it.

Re:George W Bush did

[Reverberant]

I love the "mitigating factors" such as "the gore home is four times the size of an average home." As if... To be greener, we should all get bigger homes? Brilliant!

How about quoting the rest of that sentence: "it's about four times larger than the average new American home built in 2006, and it essentially functions as both a residence and a business office since both Al and Tipper work out of their home." And by business office, that means an office with staff. They could get a smaller home and outside office spaces, but that would use more energy (plus the energy required to get to/from work).

Re:George W Bush did

[Nutria]

The natural conclusion being that we need to stop listening to the showman and start listening to the guy with the green home and the environmentally unsound public policy?

Or stop the cognitive dissonance by looking at reality: AAG (Albert Arnold Gore, Jr) preaches pie-in-the-sky impracticality but builds an energy-sucking mansion. OTOH, GWB has the money to build an eco-friendly house yet knows that a large, industrialized society needs a continuous flow of "industrial-sized" energy.

My problem with W is that he didn't stand up to Big Oil and insist that they "play nice" by using some of their jillions in profits to spill less and have better safety equipment.

Re:George W Bush did

[andyring]

Yep!

Re:George W Bush did

[SuperKendall]

Essentially functions as both a residence and a business office since both Al and Tipper work out of their home." And by business office, that means an office with staff.

So what? You can easily fit a "staff" (which I note you leave undefined, and could easily be one person, part time) in an average sized family home while still living there.

Gore is rich, so he bought and lives in a giant house. I don't see anything wrong with that but it obviously means the environment is not as important to him as Bush, who also has staff but a much smaller home that is far more efficient.

Re:George W Bush did

[HeronBlademaster]

Now how many centuries do you think you could run Al Gore's home on the fuel GWB used to regularly commute to his green ranch in his 747?

You act like Gore doesn't fly around in a private jet.

Oh, wait. He buys imaginary "carbon credits", so it's ok, right?

Re:George W Bush did

[Reverberant]

I don't see anything wrong with that but it obviously means the environment is not as important to him as Bush, who also has staff but a much smaller home that is far more efficient.

Bush just bought an 8500 sqft Dallas mansion within a two hour drive from the Crawford ranch. Methinks he has plenty of room now.

Re:George W Bush did

[jumpfroggy]

No!

Re:George W Bush did

[stewbacca]

I live in Texas. Please explain what this "basement" thing is. It sounds great.

Re:George W Bush did

[IndustrialComplex]

Come again?
There is nothing harsh about Pittsburgh's climate.
the lowest average low is in January at a whopping -6.72 C.
with a record low of only -24.
I've spent over a week at -49 with wind, and not just in a single year.
Pittsburgh is t-shirt weather.

Geothermals actually don't do that well in "harsh" climates.
my neighbour growing up, and a good friend of the family, installed geothermal a few years ago. it's not bad, but his place isn't exactly comfortable in the winter. Used in conjunction with his other heating, I believe it helps reduce the cost there, but on its own it can't stand up.

Look, he isn't just talking about MAX/MIN temperatures. Pennsylvania, as an example is the exception to most weather 'trends. Pennsylvania has extreme weather in the sense that in a given year we will see some pretty bad (not the worst) cases of all weather conditions.

But Montana gets colder you say. Yes, it very well does. However it also tends to stay cold. In PA you will have it freeze at night, thaw during the day. Maybe it will freeze and thaw several dozen times in the span where a colder climate will see a single deep freeze, or a warmer climate will generally remain cool, but above freezing. I'm just dealing with the cold side here, but there is a reason why PA's roads are almost universally understood to be the worst in the country, and it isn't due to lack of maintenance.

The climate itself is not even close to the most extreme, but it IS one of the most harsh.

I've conducted HALT (highly accelerated life testing) and survivability/reliability tests on systems, and it isn't the 90C or the -100C temperatures that worry me. It's when my system is subjected to rapid fluctuations of temperature within its operational band. It's even possible to use similar tests to weed out infant mortality in production runs. Temperature fluctuations stress solder joints, chips, as well as mechanical links, hoses, etc.

Again, you 'win'. Your climate is very extreme. But in general, if something can operate in Pennsylvania and do so reliably then it's probably a fairly robust system. Such a system won't always be the best for other climates, but there is a high probability that it would 'work' if you added a few precautions (high temp protection for Tucson, low temp considerations for Fargo).

And don't even get me started on the road treatments in PA and NY which devour cars. I'm in the process of using power tools to remove rust damage from my 2005 vehicle.

Re:George W Bush did

[networkBoy]

you sir are a waffler. I demand you get off the fence and pick a side!

For all his complaints

[Anonymous Coward]

Every single one of them would be just as much a problem if he were building a regular home. Or even buying one.

It is stressful. Unless you have enough money to just throw out a check and not worry, you're going to have problems.

From the roof to the foundation, and even in the ground. You won't know what's going to go wrong, but something will.

Re:For all his complaints

[iamhassi]

"Every single one of them would be just as much a problem if he were building a regular home."

But isn't building any home not "green".

By building a new home they're creating all new materials and you're using up more land while real estate prices are the lowest they've been in 30 years.

Isn't buying an existing home sort of like recycling? You're taking something that already existed and reusing it, isn't that what recycling is?

And after you have your existing home you don't just rip everything out of it to replace it with "green" materials, you only replace what *needs* to be replaced with green products because by throwing away perfectly good drywall and toilets you're wasting and filling landfills. Sure the existing toilet might flush 3 gallons instead of 1, but what is worse, using an extra 2 gallons of water or a toilet sitting in a landfill?

Is this thinking wrong?

Re:For all his complaints

[mellon]

The frustrating thing about reading Scott Adams' article, though, is just how many mistakes he made. Siting his house without planning for solar gain. Not hiring an experienced energy consultant. Not hiring people who knew what they were doing, basically. Building a green house is difficult--you have to do a lot of research. Unfortunately, very few builders know how to build one. But there are builders who do it for a living. So if you want a green house, and you don't want to build it yourself, hire one of *them*, not some builder who doesn't know anything about it and thinks it's a bad idea.

The whole sad saga of the attic fan was the worst of it. Has he never heard of a vented roof? A cupola to draw wind up, or a peak vent that does the same? Most green building techniques are just what everybody did before air conditioning was invented. Back when you couldn't cool a house with refrigeration, you *had* to make it energy-efficient, because the only thing cooling the house was going to be whatever passive environmental system you were able to come up with.

Re:For all his complaints

[RichiH]

It's easy to calculate this. The people I know who built/renovated houses did calculate it. It comes out as a net gain, both for the environment and the wallet. Yay for science.

Re:For all his complaints

[CAIMLAS]

+1, pretty much smack-on-the-nose with the "use old techniques".

Even without electric attic fans, there is a lot that can be done for cooling with things like the outdoor trees, good ventilation, and thermal mass. Throw in an attic fan, and heating and cooling an older house is usually not a problem. (I lived in one built in 1918 in NY; it was rarely hot in the summer due to the design.)

Many old farm houses are a perfect example of this: stone walls with faulted ceilings and a couple large windows in the kitchen.

Same thing for winter time: adding thermal mass goes a long way, and things like threshed hay on the roof is significant. Tour a historic US site sometime: the buildings may be smaller, but the walls are freakishly thick! That all adds up to a warm place in the winter and a cool place in the summer.

Modular

[istartedi]

They should build green modular homes and deliver them all over the country. A modular home is not a trailer. You can afix it to a permanent foundation, although in many parts of the country you shouldn't do that either.

Much of California, for example, in its infinite government insanity, will not allow you to live in a trailer even in a rural area. Why would I want to live in a trailer, praytell? Well, it'd be nice to think that the next time a nearby hill caught on fire, you could, you know... maybe at least have a fair chance of MOVING THE HOUSE OUT OF THE WAY. Instead, the county insists that you 1. Build a really expensive house and then 2. Permanently cement it to something that will eventually blowtorch it down, wash it away, or shake it apart.

Invariably, when fires occur they strip away trees and reveal more "illegal substandard housing" than anybody ever realized existed. These would be "people who had the right idea". It makes a helluva lot more sense to build a *shack* up there than anything more expensive. If you try to do that, the county will FINE YOU. IMHO, it's the county government that should be fined. If only we had a government by the people, for the people...

Re:Modular

[nmb3000]

Much of California, for example, in its infinite government insanity, will not allow you to live in a trailer even in a rural area.

Pretty simple, I think. California has enough problems on their plate with earthquakes and wildfires. They don't need additional natural disasters to worry about -- and everyone knows that trailer parks attract tornadoes.

Re:Modular

[OutLawSuit]

I think you'd have a different perspective on trailers if you lived in the South. They're all over the place due to how cheap they are. They're meant to used on a more temporary basis but people continue to use them as their permanent homes. As a result most trailers are in poor condition and would literally fall apart if you attempted to move them. At that point they're just an eyesore and detract from everything around them (including property values)... That's the real reason they're not allowed in most cities.

Modular Homes are completely different and are meant to be used as permanent structures, hence they have no axles. Due to how controlled the factory environment is, you'll often times get a better quality modular house than you would a conventionally built one.

Re:Modular

[lawpoop]

They should build green modular homes and deliver them all over the country.

I think this was the idea behind Buckminster Fuller's Dymaxion house

Re:Modular

[toadlife]

Correct. In CA, the populace can vote initiatives (which can include huge bonds) with 50% + 1 vote while the legislature needs a 2/3 vote to raise taxes or even pass a budget.

Re:Modular

[sjames]

Exactly. People who complain about other people living in trailers need to either cough up to buy them a house or shut up.

Re:Modular

[StingrayOZ]

This has always puzzled me. In the US most homes scream flamability.Using timber and more recently plastic for exterior finishing. Massive single glazed windows (usually with no shutters), heck even timber shingled roofing. In Australia most homes are brick (even in cities and suburbs). Those that build in fire prone areas (ie the whole of Australia) do seem to take atleast minimal efforts to minimise fire damage. Lots of water outlets, compulsory water storage for fire fighting, low famability in materials etc. Cinder/besser blocks, core filled and usually cladded in some sort of armour like fibrocement or cut sandstone, corregated steel roofing (in various colours as colour bond) with fibrocement sheeting underneath to stop cinders getting in. Shutters go over windows (they can roll up into wall cavities or being european style shutters) further enhancing fire resistance. Then people mention ecofriendly and all of a sudden the whole thing is built out of timber... Termites and fires will love that. All this is just fire resistance. There is no such thing as fire proof. Even an underground bunker isn't "fire proof" (people still die getting to them and in them). In Australia in rural areas most people shed it while they are building their dream fortress. Extremely energy efficent. Slab (usually) 100mm thick, 10x10m tin shed uses almost no metal (you can fit the material for 10 sheds on a truck) and very little fuel to get it to the location. * 3 x 120w solar cells and 12v 250A/hr batteries can run a home. Flatscreen LED, laptops, desktops, stereo, water pumps, fridges, lighting etc. More if your closer to the polar regions sure, but thats the level you need to aim at. *Instantainous LPG is an excellent way to heat water. 45kg cylinder runs my house hold for about 12 months (2 people, shower everyday). Solar boost it and it would last 5 years! * Even in the 2nd driest continent Australia 100m^2 of roofing is enough to collect all the water 2 people will need. * Heating comes from firewood that would normally rot releasing Co2 anyway. (I live on acres but LPG would also be pretty effective) Mobile homes suck, small, stinky, expensive, etc. We looked at mobile homes and shipping containers but crossed it off. Build a shed. If it burns down you can build another one off your credit card in 2 weeks.

Wealth

[gmhowell]

I'm guessing he's not as wealthy as I suspected. If he had real money, he would speak with some manservant and say "take care of this". A few months later he would enter his new green space. I guess being able to say "I'm Al Gore bitches!" carries a bit more sway than being the inventor of Dogbert.

The Perfect Is The Enemy Of The Good

[assertation]

You don't need a perfect high tech green house.

We could get a lot of bang......for very FEW bucks just using power strips, replacing incandescent light bulbs, drinking tap water and shopping with resuable backs.

Those things aren't enough, but if you could get large numbers of people doing them......and these things are cheap enough to get people to do them, it would be a huge impact

Re:The Perfect Is The Enemy Of The Good

[assertation]

Buy a Brita water pitcher. $20. You don't need to be Dilbert to afford that :)

Re:The Perfect Is The Enemy Of The Good

[assertation]

Another cheap green thing to do that makes a big difference is observing the "Meatless Monday" trend.

I don't remember where, but I read an article stating that going vegetarian just one day a week did more to reduce pollution (and was far cheaper) than being a "locovore" ( eating only locally produced food) all of the time.

Enjoy your burgers, it is just one day a week.

Where is the control experiment?

[afabbro]

Every single problem he mentions would be the same problem if he was building a "non-green" house. Lack of controls convinces him that he's suffering something out of the ordinary.

Lack of controls also tells me that after an eclipse, the reason the sun returns is that we beat tom-toms.

Re:Where is the control experiment?

[The_mad_linguist]

That doesn't make any sense.

Primitives wouldn't beat tom-toms. They'd still be using maps.

Re:LEED certification and Sick Building Syndrome

[bored_engineer]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heat_recovery_ventilation They're becoming increasingly common, particularly in colder climates. In Alaska, many newer homes are so well-sealed that a full air exchange in the house can take days. Properly sized, an HRV can provide just the right level of fresh air, and has the side benefit of recovering some of the heat. (Recovering some of the heat is important! Many areas of Alaska rely primarily on oil for heating. The Anchorage area has an extensive natural gas distribution system, but it's limited in other cities and villages, where it exists at all.)

Re:who cares

[jhol13]

I'd say it is as humorous as recent Dilberts. That is, very boring.

Besides, his assumptions are utterly idiotic. For example windows are not that bad energy losers (U < 0.8 are available easily). If you have photovoltaics the colour of the roof hardly matters. Insulation costs next to nothing, unless you want to use more expensive ones (to keep it thin). Etc, see e.g. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Low-energy_house

Re:Who needs mortar?

[MDillenbeck]

Sorry, I'm in the Nutella camp. ;) (Mmmmmm... tasty sticks...)

Re:LEED certification and Sick Building Syndrome

[MDillenbeck]

Which is why you use an air exchanger. In and out ducts are overlapped, allowing for passive heat exchange to occur (hot air vented in the winter warms the incoming air, cold air in the summer warms the incoming hot air). This actually improves air quality as you are turning over more CFM in from your house than in a traditional construction, all while recouping some of that energy you spent in heating and cooling.

What does "green" mean?

[dominion]

There was a TED talk that outlined recently why building from scratch is rarely "green". Especially when you're talking about building a big, opulent "green" mansion out in the middle of a posh suburb with a huge acreage.

People (especially the wealthy) may not want to hear it, but the greenest option is to renovate an existing structure in an urban center. Just like buying a used 1992 Honda is more "green" than buying a brand new Prius.

Building new may make you feel better about yourself, but it's definitely not the best option for the environment, by far.

Re:What does "green" mean?

[GiveBenADollar]

But buying a Prius doesn't tell everyone I'm green. If the point of being green was truly to conserve then we would see much different fads. The point of being green, to the masses at least, is to sooth your own conscience while at the same time showing everyone else how 'good' you are.

Styrofoam as the greener alternative?

[MDillenbeck]

You want to go extreme green but not buy an existing house? Try a truly modular home! I know it is extreme (styrofoam housing?!?), but imaging using a traditional home down payment to buy a small country plot and plop down a bachelor(ette) pad. No mortgage to pay, only property taxes - and then save up until you can build something as your needs grow. If I could do it here in the US, I'd seriously consider it (and if I didn't have a wife who wants a big house, of course).

Its about Resource Use, not Style

[virga]

This guy is off his rocker and mixes up "Sustainable Housing" with "Natural Building Materials" and overuse of PV panels.

Sustainable housing provides a way to live well without requiring lots of expensive resource use.

There are many styles of housing with many different construction methods to achieve the goal of Good Living with (Considerably) Less Reliance on Resources.

Resources are things like land, energy, water, construction materials, time, money. Good living means different things to different people - maybe a small modest house with no mortgage, maybe having time for family and friends, maybe living in an architectural masterpiece, maybe fitting in, or standing out.

For me good living always has a party now and then, when I have a big fire, leave the lights on, and rock out.

But most of the time, when I am not thinking, a sustainable house helps me live with need for extra heating or cooling energy, has less need for ongoing maintenance, and doesn't cost me that much.

The easiest way to use less resources is to have a beautiful small house that lasts a long time:
http://goldenbayhideaway.co.nz/abodes/little_greenie
http://tinyhouseblog.com/
http://smalllivingjournal.com/

Beauty can come from use of recycled or natural materials.
Straw: http://www.thelaststrawblog.org/2009/08/bit-bale-walls/
Earth: http://www.shac.org.nz/group/whareuku

And may have wavy lines, and be built slowly and experimentally
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earthship

Or may be slick and modern:
http://content.usatoday.com/communities/greenhouse/post/2010/07/tiny-home-lives-large/1

Or might be built offsite
http://www.fabprefab.com/fabfiles/fablisthome.htm

And in most cases, sustainable living will mean remodeling existing buildings, and encouraging higher density living - next to friends and culture.
http://www.inhabitat.com/2010/08/03/clip-on-plant-room-adds-green-space-to-apartment-buildings/

Living more sustainably gives me freedom to innovate, and has nothing to do with forcing me to live in a log, as the author seems to think - at least until that idea strikes my fancy.

-Tim

I recently met the guy who heads the BAC's online Sustainable Design course. It seems good. http://www.the-bac.edu/x350.xml

Wanna Build green?

[jameskojiro]

Build the whole damn house underground so that you need no AC or heating and grow native grasses over it. Problem solved.

Re:Wanna Build green?

[Black Gold Alchemist]

Simple. Use it for nuclear power. :-p.

Re:Wanna Build green?

[dkleinsc]

But we were evicted from our hole in the ground. We had to go live in a lake!

Re:Wanna Build green?

[Psmylie]

You were lucky to have a lake! There were a hundred and fifty of us living in a shoebox in the middle of the road.

Frankly taking ANY risk is hard!

[BLKMGK]

I did some work on my home - added a second story etc. while living in it - an adventure for sure! I learned some things. For one my contractor was a good ole boy who was so honest it wasn't funny. He did it ALL without a signed contract and he stuck to his original price despite having to wait a YEAR to begin! It took a year to get permits and to get the damned architect to properly do the plans, we waited on weather some too. Jackass architect drew in 2X4 walls and not 2X6, not noticed by me till they were banging nails - grr. The first few sets of plans were a joke and the very first time my contractor caught a GLARING error before he even got out of their office. The architect hated my contractor but my contractor knew how to build and was catching all sorts of errors. Thankfully he worked around the ones in the final plans just fine.

So, I wanted to do some odd things my guy hadn't seen before. For starters I had a specific toilet in mind. You know, a low flow toilet that WORKS! Toto Drake for those wondering - just wish it had more water in the bowl so keep a brush handy. He thought it was silly to want a specific toilet and darn it the thing cost MORE. Wow, it works he finds out. Guess who now has two in HIS home :-) I wanted "solar tubes". What in the world are those he wonders. Well the guy puts them in and wow, lots of LIGHT from outside. My contractor thinks this is pretty cool - don't think he's bought any yet. I wanted a tin roof. Now he's seen these and he's had them done. I had a good quote from a guy but when the guy came out to look over the job he made the cardinal sin of ignoring my contractor - this pissed him off. My contractor got his buddy on the phone and shaved multiple thousands of dollars off the price just to spite this jerk - likely burned a favor. Took the guys maybe two hours to put up that roof too. Rolls off the reel through an extruder and up go the panels onto the roof. I wanted spray foam insulation too. Why would I want that? Well the downstairs leaked like a sieve and I wanted it quiet. Research I found said to spray it under the roof decking and make the attic a controlled space. Contractor and roofing guy not happy, insulation guy not so sure. Govt. studies say this saves money bigtime but if the roof decking gets too hot and fries I'm out big bux. Never mind that Govt study was partially conducted in Florida. I relent but I still have the stuff in my walls and attic - it rocks! My contractor also does Tyvek wrap, rigid foam with foil, and the insulator guys sealed every nook with caulk too. End result is awesome but pricey. Insulator says they never do this in homes but in businesses all the time. A/C and heating guy nearly passed out when I told him what we had for insulation - my heat pump doesn't have to work at all but is sized for efficiency. Tankless hot water heater and softener system. Why would I do that? Well endless hot water for the big tub I had installed and the efficiency is off the chart compared to the previous somewhat new water heater. Literally - the two charts don't overlap the new one is so good! I wanted good windows - Pella is what I chose. All sorts of coatings and stuff. I had gotten a ballpark at a homeshow on price. Pella only sells through regional dealers if you buy their good stuff - price is sky high. My contractor is NOT happy and talks them down a couple hundred per window. Love this guy! I get a seriously good attic trap door with insulation and gasketed seals - everyone thinks I'm nuts till that sucker goes up and seals like a drum. I wanted good temp compensating shower fixtures - I buy them online for way less than local. Plumber freaks at the puzzle he has to build to plumb it. I use a local tile and granite guy instead of a big box store or boutique bath place. I save TONS and the guy is very happy to have my business - I've been back for more stuff twice.

So in the end I saved a bunch and obviously went over budget. Every single time I wanted to do something "odd" I got questioned and quizzed. If you aren't

Re:Frankly taking ANY risk is hard!

[mrchaotica]

Funny, I see Scott preaching about radiant barriers.

I could be mistaken, but I'm pretty sure your tin roof is a radiant barrier.

spray foaming my damned crawlspace

Have you considered insulating the crawlspace walls instead of the floor (i.e., making the crawlspace conditioned space, like you did with your attic)?

Re:Frankly taking ANY risk is hard!

[BLKMGK]

This wasn't new construction so what was existing remains. The back of the house is heavily shaded by a gigantic Oak tree that stands a good 4+ stories tall. That's on the North side. South side has nothing shading it except some incidental shade from neighbor's giant Oaks to the SouthWest, West side is pretty well shaded. I have a 4 story tall Holly tree too but it's not providing shade. Most windows face South with only the upper story getting sunlight in them. Were it not for the partial shading I get from neighbor trees I'd likely have a couple of solar racks up there and will try in the future.

Perhaps not the best engineered setup but the rear of the house is cooled in Summer by the Oak and in Summer the sun isn't heating things up too much thanks to coatings and insulation. Original home was built circa 1940 BTW and it's no mansion but I enjoy it.

Re:who cares

[Jarik C-Bol]

actually, with well designed argon filled double pane windows, your windows will transmit less heat *than the surrounding walls* white roofs make a huge difference (just ask anyone who has to run ethernet cable through attics in the summer in the southwest, dark roof = miserable, light roof = not so bad). insulation is not as cheep as you think.

Re:Going white?

[twidarkling]

Most people waste inordinate amounts of water, which takes resources to purify both before and after it's used, since any that isn't absorbed goes to run-off to the sewers, which needs to be treated in most areas. Then you get pesticide use, herbicide use, chemical fertilizers, gas-powered lawnmowers, etc. How the hell can you possibly think a conventional lawn is good for the environment? A properly cared-for garden? Kick-ass. Your average suburban lawn? Fucks up the environment.

Re:who cares

[pnewhook]

For example windows are not that bad energy losers

I beg to differ. If you are looking for enery loss guidelines, the rule of thumb is the best window is the same as the worst wall.

Insulation costs next to nothing

Really? Ever try and make an R40 roof or R20 wall? Not ridiculous, but not nothing either.

Re:who cares

[Jeremi]

Both are easily avoided with a little forethought as to location and distance from main roads

Of course, if you build your green house out in the boonies, and then have to commute 50 miles to get to work every day, you probably haven't done the environment any favors.

Clearly the trick is to be a cartoonist, so you can work at home and send in your work product by email each day.

Re:who cares

[Ironhandx]

Your average 1200 sq ft bungalow needs 6880 square feet of r20 insulation (a little less since you can take stud width out, but you usually leave that in and just come up a few bags over)

That means properly insulated, r40 roof, r40 floor and r20 walls. Average bag of insulation should be around $35 CAD or $30 USD and does about 50 square feet on the average(usually a bit less, and the reason you leave in the stud widths if using regular lumber). So in total you need about 138 bags of insulation to do it right. Grand total cost is around 5k CAD or a bit less USD and you'll save enough in AC/Heat in the first 3 years in most places to be in money from doing it, so any argument about up front capital cost is moot as average time spent in a purchased home before selling is well over 3 years, at least in Canada. Especially when you consider average house cost is over 100k(a lot over 100k in some cases), even for that modest bungalow. 5k isn't much to tack on when theres already 100k going into the place.

Thats not including your basement if it exists but a good vapour barrier and 2 layers of R7 1.5 inch styro around all of the interior cement, a good water barrier on the outside and a good sealer and sub floor on the cement floor will remove the r40 floor as a necessity(probably still want to do r20 just for sound reasons, at least, I know I would) and cover the insulation needs the same. Shit, an uninsulated basement is probably the #1 cause of overpaying on heat bills, again, in canada, but I can't imagine its much different south of the border. I've had people cut their heat bills in half with just the double styro insulation around the cement.

architect

[gedw99]

i am an architect and i think this guy is partly to blame but also pulling everyones leg a bit.

But the case rests with the architect. Its his job to show the cleint WHY it makes sense to NOT use natural gas etc.
Its his job to make sure the right net metering meter is installed by the elec company BEFORE the end of the build.

building green these dasy is VERY easy in reality IF you know what your doing.
In many way it is cheaper. For example.

1. walls. use a high thermal insulation monolithic wall. This lowers cost by having little labour. This also automatically air seals the building.
Hemp is good and very cheap.
you now dont need an exterior cladding or interior gypsum . thats allot of labour and material saved.
you just skim coat the exterior and interior walls with a lime wash and it looks great and will last forever.
you also saved yourself a fortune in paint. Paint is expensive BTW.
2. Use a Substructure like a portal frame construction. this takes 2 days to erect for a house, and allows you to place wall where ever you want.
you only need a post every 4 meters on the outer wall.
now you can use pad footing under these post and the rest of the floor can be raised timber. you just saved yourself a fortune in concrete and earthworks.
3. ensure you have a dedicated electrical and plumbing riser and hvac riser. This makes running all pipes and cabling dead easy. It mean the plumber and elec get in and out of their fast and so saves alot of money.
4. a properly insulated house does NOT need much heating. The active ventilation system just needs a fan coil exchangers on the supply side and that the heating for the whole house. You just saved yourself about 10,000 euros by not putting in floor heating everywhere.
5. Windows to the sunny side, and few windows everywhere else. I know this is a major design restriction, but it saves you a fortune in energy bills.
If its a hot climate make sure you have bigger eaves than normal so in summer you don't get too much. The active ventilation will dump heat outside if its required.

Re:Going white?

[IICV]

The absolute worst part here in Southern California is all of this lawn we've got. They use some Norman Rockwell grade grass that looks exactly like what you expect grass to look like, but is a bitchass to maintain. It has to be watered literally every day, and if the Santa Ana winds (dry and hot and fast) blow in unexpectedly, whole swathes of that stuff just go brown overnight and die. They replace it within a week most times, but the waste! Oh my God, the waste! And nobody ever walks on it, so all of that is useless.

What they really should do is plant those gorgeous native grasses everywhere - hillocks of green, literally shining (for some reason parts of it are silver from certain angles), doesn't need much watering (because it's native grass, it's used to how often it rains down here), doesn't die off if the weather changes unexpectedly, and grows in uneven little hills so people won't walk on it as much.

Basically, if companies didn't insist on having Norman Rockwell style lawns, we could use a shitload less water and things would look a lot nicer too.

Homeless People Are Most Efficient

[NicknamesAreStupid]

Their carbon footprint is the size of their feet. They recycle things, like food, that are not considered recyclable. They are the model of future green. They are also the fastest growing segment of the population.

Re:Homeless People Are Most Efficient

[HeckRuler]

Ok, so I had an insightful chat with my wife the other day. She's "green conscious". A recycling nazi, buys CFLs, wants an electric or hybrid car, buys organic*, even bought me an electric mower (thanks honey), but still bought a biggish house, wants a big TV, and is getting fancy furniture. Kinda the stereotypical greenie. She had a hard believing this thing she read where the slums of Bangladesh are the greenest urban environment. So I explained that it's all about absolute consumption. I got her to kinda understand that having kids isn't green. She had a real hard time accepting that mass murder is very green. And it is, if you kill off a swath of people, then the absolute consumption, CO2 generated, energy used, resources destroyed, and all that jazz will be significantly reduced. The greenest thing is absence. And that's why Scott Adams points out that not having a house is the greenest.

But that's moot. It's not really important. The quest shouldn't be to "be green", but rather to help society in some way PER "green unit". Whatever the hell a "green unit" would be. So building a house helps society, it gives someone a place to live. But building a house that doesn't need gallons of exotic water shipped from out of state every week is better, because it provides the same benefit while being greener. Likewise, if you can feed a bunch of orphans, but you have to tear down pristine rain forest to do it, then that's arguably a bad thing.

So I want to redirect the quest to be green. That one doesn't lead anywhere nice. People should try to be green when it's an option, but still try to do something good for the world.

Scott Adams: Has Been

[Doc Ruby]

I bought a house in the NYC suburbs last year, gutted it, and renovated it to conserve energy. I basically sprayfoamed the walls, floors and roof really thick, use all CFLs, install some really cool smart ventilation devices, and did some other stuff that was a lot more minor like buy the most efficient appliances. I cut my energy use down to something like 1/6th the average in the area per square foot, even though I left the ceilings open into the attic (which lets heat rise away from the lower level where we can feel it). I didn't need any permits or any "experimental beaver" tech. It took some imagination, analysis and choosing between different ways of doing things, but like any engineering project I just had to be careful thinking of how the individual consequences added up to system performance. Ultimately it was a big investment, but it'll pay back in under 5 years. Even at current energy prices, which since they're going to go up will probably be closer to 3 years; after that we'll be netting income equal to what we'd have paid the utility monopolies instead.

I don't know what Scott Adams' problem is, especially in California where there's little weather and the climate is so mild, and green construction industries are everywhere, along with referrals and reviews of them, and plenty of state funding. Maybe he's only as good at actual engineering as he is at being funny, which he hasn't been since a decade ago, when he was a better cartoonist than an engineer.

Rammed Earth

[jjohnson]

Many old construction techniques hold up surprisingly well in modern terms for both comfort, durability and cost. Rammed earth is a technique going back millennia, and rammed earth structures still exist today. The Great Wall of China is one example (rammed earth core, faced with brick), but there are others.

Briefly, you dump properly pulverized soil into the same sort of mold into which you'd pour concrete. Soak it with water and use a pneumatic tamper to compress it 50%, then repeat in layers 5-10 inches thick. Like concrete, it cures over time, and has about 25% the structural strength--more than sufficient for small and medium sized structures. If you're in a wet climate, you apply a sealing coat, and you're done.

Like concrete, you can reinforce it with rebar to make it earthquake-resistant. The material itself can come directly from the site where you're building. It's fireproof, soundproof, insect-resistant, and has similar thermal properties to brick or concrete. There's basically no waste. As a building material, it's an environmentalist's wet dream.

Re:Rammed Earth

[Attila Dimedici]

Actually there is a recent (last 30 years) development that is an improvement over rammed earth and only marginally more expensive. That is cement-mud bricks. Using a little bit of cement mixture in mud allows the development of bricks suitable for building a small structure that will withstand the elements very well and does not require the sealing coat to protect against water in a wet climate. Sorry, I do not have the details anymore, but it is a building process used by some aid agencies when working with some of the very poorest in third world countries.

Re:Which unsound policies? Worse than now?

[mellon]

Where do you guys get this stuff? We aren't even to the mid-term elections yet, and you're claiming that Obama set up the regulatory structure that lead to (I presume) the disaster in the Gulf? How exactly did he accomplish this? What regulations did he dismantle that were in place when Bush was in office? Do you have one iota of documentation for this claim? Why am I hearing about this for the first time on /.?

In any case, we weren't even talking about this--we were talking about green building!

Re:Which unsound policies? Worse than now?

[Cheech Wizard]

You must have been asleep for the last 20 years or so (or you have severe, advanced Alzheimer's disease) if you really believe it was under Obama's watch that oversight of oil wells were allowed to "...diminish to the point of catastrophe...". He's been in office less than 2 years. BP has a history of safety violations going back years. Bush II, Clinton, Bush I and Reagan are all complicit in reducing and/or eliminating the regulatory structure in the oil business (and other businesses as well, considering Enron, the savings and loan crisis of the 1980's, the stock market meltdown, the housing bubble, etc.).

Re:who cares

[RobertM1968]

Yes, A guy who actually has DONE it is probably far less informed than random people on the internet quoting numbers.

PS. Ever own a house? Sure, my double-pane windows rock ... the casings, on the other hand, leak like a sieve.

Actually, he was less informed. Take that from someone who has done all sorts of construction. The fact that he has missteps and made bad choices does not mean it's not doable, nor does it mean it's not economically feasible. As some for instances, there are various utility companies who will not pay money for power generated. You still get a bill for what you use though. Oh, wait, that's not legal. Yep! Ask BGE why, they tell you that though it is the law that they have to buy power from you, that there is no law yet that tells them how they are supposed to do it. Until then, they aren't paying anyone (at least not as of the last time I checked - by now, enough people may have made a stink to force them to follow the law). Our friend just had an installation done that cost him $6000 after rebates (because it was done right), and we've started on ours. Much of the time, he's selling back to the electric company (which our current one, fortunately, does properly buy power back and credit you for it).

Take the insulation... there are tons of new insulation, lab tested, R value and all, all eco-friendly - oops, guess he simply made a bad choice there too. Take the solar. Oddly, most people who install them get enough rebates that the system can be paid for in 5 years... not 15. Of course, if one does it wrong, there are a lot less rebates (or none). The system has to be able to generate a certain amount of electricity during each season - if not (because you stuck it under trees, in the shade, or facing the wrong direction), then you aren't eligible for a lot of (or any) rebates. Take his other suggestions (stone walls... btw, they work great on the outside too... no reason to have a living room with a stone wall), thick slab foundation, and so on... duh! Sounds like he forgot those and realized them as an "ooops, here's what you should consider which would have made things better for us had we considered it"

Should I go on? Also, green homes do not need to be ugly. Wanna know how you can cut costs? Get good appliances. And no, I dont mean the top of the line "crap" sold at your local appliance store (Sears, Home Depot, Lowes, wherever). They make full size refrigerators that use 200W - NOT 1200W. Similar (electricity) savings can be found on other appliances as well. Ensure you have entirely LED or CFL lighting. Once you are done, during spring and summer, how much electricity is it to run a house? Let's see... 200-300W for the fridge, 20 lights at 3W is another 60W, plus the incidentals. During summer, use cooling from a heat/cooling pump (pumps coolant into a ground chamber, comes out at 55 degrees or so... inotherwords, ideal to drop the house temperature to something nice - or to something cool with AC using a LOT less electricity). In the winter, the same can be done to "warm" the water before it's used to heat the house. Things like floor heating, when not needed, can simply be a flow valve away from being removed from the loop - and since the lines are filled with "antifreeze" (a chemical like it), no worries about it freezing and busting a pipe (c'mon, this flow valve idea is common sense - people use stuff like that all the time for lawn sprinklers that have multi-zones, for ponds and fish pools and more). As for the lawn, one can use runoff, if one builds a cistern or some other containment. People are already doing that, and collecting enough in most areas like his, to water a full lawn, and have water extra for toilets, and an overflow for when it gets too full.

Well, I could keep going on and on. Honestly, he made mistakes (BIG ones), read the wrong magazines/websites, and is complaining (whining?) about it now.

no, buying a really fuel-efficient car is greener.

[spage]

Just like buying a used 1992 Honda is more "green" than buying a brand new Prius.

You're so confident you're right, but you aren't. fueleconomy.gov says the 1992 Honda Accord Wagon manual gets 19 city, 25 hwy. Let's take the best and say it gets 25 mpg. Meanwhile the Prius gets 50 mpg. Half as much gasoline. But the allegedly smug Prius buyer has bought 3,042 pounds of evil raw-materials-turned-manufactured-goods into our disposable consumption-based modern world, and obviously that's terrible and he should wise up and hang his head in shame. Let's kick him in the nads for his stupidity, right?

No. Over 120,000 miles that 1992 Accord will use 4800 gallons of gasoline, which at 6.125 lbs each weigh 14.8 tons. Burning that gasoline will emit 46 tons of CO2. Driving a Prius instead halves those numbers.

And that doesn't take into account the pollution from producing, spilling, refining and distributing those TONS of unrecyclable gasoline. The onus is on you and others spouting this nonsense to prove that 1.5 tons of mostly recyclable car is more pollution than 7 additional tons of gasoline going up in smoke. It simply isn't. My basic math lesson here is a gross simplification of why all reputable studies conclude 75-90% of the lifecycle pollution of a car occurs in its operation, not in its manufacture.

The next nail in the coffin of this bullshit meme is your car use doesn't occur in a vacuum. If you're already driving and you get a different car, what happens to your old one? If it's a gas guzzler, it's a win to junk it for the math above. If it isn't, someone else will probably take it and junk their gas guzzler. Another way to consider the problem is even simpler: the primary way to improve the overall efficiency of the car fleet is for people to buy more fuel-efficient cars.

None of this is to say that owning a car is "green". Scott Adams is right to point out it's a loaded term, but not because of this stupid American obsession to find hypocrisy in unrelated actions ("You think you're green with your bicycle, but you wear leather shoes, ya hypocrite!"). Green is just a relative term. A Prius is greener than a 1992 Accord if you drive the distances most Americans do. Driving less is always greener. Not buying a car at all and bicycling is greener still. etc.

Re:You mean like these scientists?

[microbox]

The truth is there are Many Scientists

My friend, on page 45 of said book, Soloman states quite clearly that human beings are causing climate change.

So... what's your point again?

PS: There is a difference between science and propaganda. Epistemology is the philosophy of how you know something for certain. A person with 60 IQ points could work out that the nile is a river in egypt.

Re:who cares

[toastar]

or Will Smith

Re:who cares

[spidkit]

The author spends quite a bit of time making good natured jokes of his personal experience and unfortunately (well meaning as he appears to be) drops in some rather misleading information. The German Passivhaus standard is a type of house he could have considered. The standard was implemented in 1996 (predicated on some work done on project houses in Saskatchewan Canada in 1977, as well as in Massachusetts, and also by the University of Illinois) is readilly achievable, even in very cold climates (like colder parts of Germany, Austria and Alberta Canada. Windows do not have to be some energy leaking sieves at all. Good windows require thermal breaks and should be triple glazed. South facing windows are large for heat gain in winter months and canopied for blocking high summer rays.

These houses basically - and readilly (with installed solar systems including Photovoltaic and Solar Hot Water, achieve a "Net Zero" energy requirement: In the span of one year on average, and all within their property envelope (urban settings too) they produce an amount of energy equal to, or more than ("Net Positive"), the energy they consume. That also requires choosing energy efficent appliances (fridges can be power hogs otherwise) that consume low Killowat hours of energy. LED lights are excellent. induction cookers as well. The key thing on Passivhaus design is that the house has a very high R-value all round (walls can be a foot thick of insulation and roofs are R 80) and the house must be air-sealed to a specific blower door pressure test stardard.

Passivhauses do not have to look like bunkers or lunar outposts by necessity. The Mill Creek Net Zero home in Alberta is one pleasing example, or this example in Salem, Oregon. Because the houses are so well sealed (in contrast to regular built houses that leak air badly), air exchangers are a necessity and key to having fresh air. One of the benefits of a passivhaus is that the air is extremely fresh. To save conserve space heating energy heat recovery ventillators are used. Some heat recovery ventillators can be anywhere from 95 to 99% efficient. In some cases - even in cold climates, the passivhaus standard built house actually doesn't need an auxilliary heating system, but the City officials can get a little freaked out and demand one anyway. Germany has many of these houses. Passivhauses can also work in hot climates as well.

Re:LEED certification and Sick Building Syndrome

[bored_engineer]

Anecdotes are fun. I have a friend in Fairbanks (a poet) who built a cabin, quite literally, with his own two hands. The doors, triple-pane windows, everything are hand-built. His two-story cabin (probably 600 sf total) warms in about 30 minutes once his wood stove is started. He collects 4 cords or wood each summer, and every third or fourth year he has enough left over that he doesn't need to collect that one year. It's an amazingly tight place. (He once bragged that his 6-candle candelabra keeps the place comfortable at -30F.)

Like your Finnish homeowner, my friend has very thick doors, with tight wool gaskets to match. The roof is about R-60 in the summer, and because the snow doesn't melt on top, gets much more insulating in the winter. No water and an outhouse make the cabin somewhat too rugged for more conventional folks to raise kids in, though.

. . . I don't think that I know anybody with a "greener" house than his, though.

Re:who cares

[NitWit005]

Thanks for the ego trip. The guy obviously talked to a lot of people, some of them surely more knowledgeable than you are. The problem , as me mentions, is that people don't agree on what is a good idea. You seem to be giving questionable advice just like he was given. Don't use the wattage of refrigerator to determine the energy use . That's the power consumed when its on. The 200W fridges are unlikely to be energy efficient because they have to run constantly to keep up (if they do keep up). Insulation matters too. Look at rated kWh per year. The rates are published.

The only thing that matters

[ledow]

The only thing that ever matters in these kinds of projects, the only thing WORTH measuring, is how long until it starts to pay for itself. Not the electrical system, or the "money saved" on your normal use, but the time until you're actually in profit on the venture as a whole.

It's a crass and crude measure but the money invested into getting something like photovoltaics, underfloor heating, etc. is directly related to the difficulty of manipulating the raw materials, the cost of extraction, the rarity, the difficulty of transporting them, installing them, the environmental impact they have (via taxes, subsidies, etc.). Marble floors, stone walls, etc. have wonderful properties but require you to move tons of stone cross-country (and even across continents). Photovoltaics contain some rare minerals, require lots of energy to manipulate, produce, dispose of and maintain, etc.

If we're talking houses then if you can't have the systems pay themselves off in less than 25 years, you're wasting your time. In 25 years, you could have bought and paid for any house you could afford, that would almost certainly sell for more than you bought it once your mortgage term is up (and thus provide overall profit even with your monthly mortgage expenditure), even despite interest accrued, ongoing maintenance and everything else - the house would "pay for itself" and any environmental damage that you incurred that wasn't directly related to its construction (i.e. I assume you bought a house that already existed, not have one constructed especially). Also, you could live in it and not have to worry about maintaining a roof garden unless you wanted to, or finding specialist contractors when your one-off heating/cooling system goes wrong.

If your super-duper green house, or your super-duper energy production system, doesn't start turning an *overall* profit in less than 25 years, you're wasting your time and actually COSTING more energy than you're saving - in planning, analysis, trips to the city to find an engineer / consultant / whatever, maintenance, replacement, time-wasting, application-lodging, construction etc.etc.etc. Although theoretically perfect solar systems can turn profits in certain parts of the world relatively quickly, this isn't true of a VAST proportion of other things that are necessary. The energy used to BUILD a new house? Hell, that's not small - and if you paid for that and then hope to get that money back by later selling the house, or on savings on unnecessary utilities, all you've done is sold your green credentials for cash on the first step anyway.

In the end, the places and people that are the greenest are NOT those putting HVAC systems in their houses at all, or even understand how a photovoltaic works. It's the people living in countries where the problems of heating, cooling, water supply, etc. were solved MILLENNIA ago and they still retain elements of that culture. Most of them are farmers. Most of them live in white-covered buildings constructed from local stone. Most of them have shutters on their windows. Most of them have land on which they can grow their own food and not have to transport food in little metal tins from foreign countries to survive. Most of them have simple solutions like wells, wood-burning stoves, their own animals and crops, houses constructed in such a way that the roof-patio is about 40 degrees C hotter than the wine cellar for most of the year. Most of them live in houses that have almost literally been maintenance-free for the last 2-3 hundred years and are likely to last at least that again.

They have electricity and televisions and, yes, they probably could generate their own but they know it's unlikely to produce any return on their investment unless they get it absolutely, perfectly correct and even then that it's "cheating" and not really being green. Hell, some of them might even have water mills on a local water source and still the investment in copper cabling, electronic safety systems, generators and electric lighting/h

Re:no, buying a really fuel-efficient car is green

[wrook]

According to this Wired article, it takes 113 million BTUs to make a Prius: http://www.wired.com/science/planetearth/magazine/16-06/ff_heresies_09usedcars

They claim that is about 1000 gallons of gasoline (not really willing to do the math myself, I'll accept it). They also argue that the smelting of the 30 lbs of nickel used for the batteries is very bad for the environment. Also, don't know one way or another, but it wouldn't surprise me.

For some reason you chose to compare a 1992 Honda wagon to a Prius. Well, when I say "for some reason" I meant, because it makes your argument look good. Since the parent just said 1992 Honda, I'll go with the Civic hatchback with manual transmission that gets 33/42 mpg for similar reasons.

So now the Honda is using 2790 gallons of fuel and the Prius (taking into consideration production costs) is using 3800.

Buying a used car (and not being stupid about it) *is* more energy efficient than buying a new car.

Re:Going white?

[mgblst]

That is only irony if you are mentally retarded.

Re:Which unsound policies? Worse than now?

[The Master Control P]

Obama failed because he couldn't reverse, in his first year, the effects of 30 years of foolish deregulation and the deregulation itself... and when the effects of that came home to roost at Deepwater Horizon, it proved that regulation is of no use? That's like buying a car, systematically removing its safety systems, then saying safety systems are useless because you were horribly injured in a crash: The mind boggles.

Re:Which unsound policies? Worse than now?

[Gadget_Guy]

you're claiming that Obama set up the regulatory structure that lead to (I presume) the disaster in the Gulf?

I'm saying that he let the regulatory structure that was there wither

How? What did he do to reduce the quality of the regulation covering offshore drilling? Perhaps you believe that by not improving the regulation that this constitutes a whithering effect.

It's as much about what you don't do as what you do.

Are yes, you do. In that case, why make this a partisan argument against Barack Obama? Surely then you should attribute eight times more blame to the previous administration, given that they had eight years compared to Obama's one.

Actually George W Bush was more responsible for the incident because his administration had the opportunity to avert this problem and actively decided against implementing additional safety features. In 2003 the Minerals Management Service considered requiring remote controlled shut-off switches for drilling rigs. They decided against forcing them to install the devices because they cost too much.

Perhaps if they had gone the other way (against the wishes of big business) then this would have been just a workplace accident rather than a major environmental catastrophe.

As for Obama, he didn't have much time to think much about offshore drilling operations because he came into the presidency in the middle of the GFC. Or do you think he somehow caused that too?

Re:who cares

[polar red]

You have very badly insulated walls. the best windows on the market are triple pane with about U=0.5, the best double-panes are 0.8 or 0.9. a badly insulated wall starts at max U=0.6 (I think the building-standard(in Belgium) calls for U=0.35 walls) [LOWER is BETTER]
[I think U = the # watts lost per hour per degree difference in Kelvin]

Those things are good to do

[stomv]

but they're nibbling around the edges. The key is energy consumption. Light bulbs are a part of it, but here are some others.

One time ideas:
  * Refrigerators. When you get a new one, get a really efficient one. Then, get rid of the old one -- or old few in your basement or garage. The old ones use an incredible amount of electricity, both because they were less efficient to begin with and because as they age they often fail in such a way that they don't cycle properly, resulting in even higher energy use.
  * AC. Don't replace your AC unit... yet. First, get your attic air sealed and insulated... and as much of the rest of your house as possible. Then, ask to have the size of your AC re-evaluated. It's likely that your AC is oversized, and not only will you save with a new one because it's more efficient, you'll also save because it's smaller. Plus, there are plenty of gov't programs to subsidize all of this.
  * Heating. Same story as AC.
  * Switch to gas. If you're a New Englander with oil heat, switch to natural gas if you can. That's a 1/3 reduction in CO_2 per therm right off the bat. Again, gov't programs subsidize.
  * Move closer to work/shopping/transit. Maybe not today, but the next time it's time to move.
  * Move to a smaller home. Maybe not today, but the next time it's time to move.

All-the-time opportunities:
  * Adjust the thermostat to require a sweater in the winter, or a cold drink in the summer. Programmable thermostats are a nice feature for many users too.
  * Wash your clothes on cold. Hang your clothes to dry -- they'll last longer, and it'll save energy. Switch to a gas dryer if possible.

Those are some big opportunities, and that doesn't include driving (for which there are many ways to save). The things you mention help, but these are the ones which have a major impact. Not everybody can do all of them, but picking off one or two of these will save major... for example, washing on cold or hanging to dry saves about 2.5 kWh per use. You'd need to keep your CFL on for 100 hours to make up for the electricity of one time using your electric dryer.

Re:Those things are good to do

[drinkypoo]

Here's some things you can do without compromising your lifestyle:

1) If you must drive, as your next car, buy a turbo-diesel. They get better mileage and diesel takes 60% as much energy to produce as gasoline.
2) In the summer, add mylar to windows to reflect sunlight and trap cool air. In the winter, add clear plastic to windows to permit sunlight and trap warm air.
3) Get a canister water filter instead of drinking bottled water. Suggesting that people drink tap water is suggesting that they poison themselves, in most areas. Chlorine, chloramines... But you can buy an undersink mount filter with a carbon-impregnated cartridge for about $30, maybe $40 with all the fittings you'll need to install it, teed off the cold water line. Another $10 gets you a cute little faucet. You can make your own with aquarium charcoal, pipe, pipe fittings, and nylon mesh, but you won't save all that much.
4) Always-on electrical loads? You can buy a plug-in grid-tie solar panel very cheaply these days. Just plug it in where you have your PC plugged in, or whatever.
5) Close off rooms you're not using. You don't have to buy a smaller home to gain greater energy efficiency.

An advanced form: you can deliver heat/cold only to rooms that need them by installing a thermostat which has been hacked to control a servo (PIC will do, Arduino for the lazy and rich) into each room, and having the room registers open themselves only when demanding air. In most homes, delivering both heat and cold at the same time is not practical.

Joke about family

[paxcoder]

You make the mistake of mentioning this arrangement to your family, and they leave you. But you are not deterred because you're saving the planet, damn it. You'll get a new family. A greener one.

I can see how someone would leave a person who can make that joke.

Close, but no cigar

[Shivetya]

People who tend to tell others how to live rarely live as such. Those who live right tend to not brag about it. You have the cynical conclusion. The natural conclusion is to live like the guy with the green home and ignore the guy in the mansion.

I would love to see a President with a sound environmental policy, however what one person declares as sound another dismisses as not enough. Bush did fine considering the history of our past Presidents. Some areas are flash points for one group or another and both will use such to disclaim any leader.

No, given what we know about the two men in question, I would invite the guy from Crawford over to dinner, more than likely the other guy wouldn't even deem to acknowledge the request.

Re:Close, but no cigar

[Red Flayer]

No, given what we know about the two men in question, I would invite the guy from Crawford over to dinner,

And after all, that's what our national leaders should be -- people we'd like to have dinner or a beer with, people we'd like to go to a ball game with.

WTF? Who cares if Gore is more of a self-righteous prick than Bush -- it's the issues that matter.

Fucking "conservative" charismatics -- they're why this nation is going to hell in a handbasket. They get the masses to vote for them on bogus wedge issues, then proceed to destroy our economy, our land, and our people via overspending on their buddies' contracting companies, allowing regulatory capture in every industry, cutting their buddies' taxes, and passing the buck to future administrations and generations.

Fuck them.

Sorry for the rant. I'll go get my coffee now.

Re:Which unsound policies? Worse than now?

[misexistentialist]

With Obama in charge BP was given exceptions to complying with regulations, like assessing the damage that a spill could cause, which is pretty key to determining what preventative measures are necessary. If Obama was incompetent or malfeasant, being less so than the other guy is irrelevent. You might as well give every future president a free pass because GW Bush was in the chain of causation.

Re:no, buying a really fuel-efficient car is green

[renoX]

Frankly both your arguments and the GPs one are ridiculous:
- say you buy your car and just after there is a new one which is 0.00001% more efficient, should you dump your car and buy the new one immediately? No!
- say there's a new car which use only 1% of the normal car, should you keep using your old car, due to the energy cost of building this new car? No!

So there is a curve (X, Y)(X is the improvement of fuel consumption and Y is the energy needed to build the car) where it becomes more interesting to switch or not,
it would be interesting to know these figures for realistic cases..
I don't know how to compute them, unfortunately!

Re:To the people modding me down - why hide?

[HeckRuler]

Yeah, it's when you think you should be modded up when you're full of shit that you know you're a wingbat.

"I'm right, so you should mod me up"
"I'm wrong, so you should mod me up"
Ladies and Gentlemen, you need this level of doublethink to blame the gulf oil ecopocalypse on Obama. Now, if you want to blame his reaction, handleing, or future planned response, then go for it.

Re:Which unsound policies? Worse than now?

[DrgnDancer]

This has to be one of the stupidest things I've ever read. It's comparable in stupidity to the equally stupid far left commentators who blamed Bush for 9/11. I'm no fan of GWB, but blaming a man for a disaster than happened within a year or two of his taking office is just insane. It takes time to realign Federal bureaucracy. In the case of 9/11 the blame lies as much or more with Clinton, Bush Sr. and even Reagan as with GWB. More really, GWB *might* have improved the non-traditional intelligence community had he been given a chance (he probably wouldn't have, but it's moot since he wasn't given the opportunity). Same thing here. Obama inherited a broken regulatory system and hasn't had a chance to fix it (again, he may or may not have actually done so if the disaster hadn't happened, we'll never know now).

Presidents are responsible for the things that happen on their watch, certainly. In both cases the President took responsibility, and vowed to fix what was broken (success or failure not withstanding), but that doesn't mean it was the current President's fault. Being stuck with the bag doesn't make you a bank robber, though it makes you responsible for some of the consequences of the bank robbery.

Re:To the people modding me down - why hide?

[Burpmaster]

You know, if someone thought my arguments were really wrong, made no sense - they would in fact upvote my post, so that everyone could see just how "wrong" I was.

Who does that? Do you do that?

I'd say other people are downmodding you for the same reason I'd downmod you right now if I had modpoints: you just want the party you serve to be in power, but you don't care what they do with that power. And you make stuff up to support whatever you want to claim. The quoted text is a perfect example.

Ingrediants for a greener home:

[ResidentSourcerer]

1. Buy the archive of the back issues of Mother Earth News. Not all the ideas are practical, but many are, and the rest can lead to further ideas.

2. Smaller is greener.

3. If you are innovating in construction technique, build so that it can be modified.

* Build in access to pipes.
* Wire in conduits.
* Extra conduits so you can network, or put in 12v DC, or whatever later.
* Attic access for later addition of fans.
* Power outlets in the attic.
* Steep pitched roof so that most of your attic access is not on your hands and knees.
* Use screws whereever you think you MIGHT want to change things.

4. Zone your heating/cooling system.

5. Do your best calculation for heating needs -- then put in a unit half that size. But leave room to add a second one later. This will give you redundancy, at some increase in expense.

HVAC people seem to overestimate heating and underestimate ventilation. Put in bigger exhaust fans than they tell you.

6. If you are in a net heating environment, design your house to have most of the windows on the south.

7. In our climate (10000 degree days, central Alberta) a dual glazed south facing window has better net performance than triple glazing.

8. Don't bother with argon/krypton. The gas is gone in 5 years.

9. In a well made window, a sizeable amount of the heat loss is on the edges. Use fewer but larger units.

10. If you are building a single floor house in a heating climate, considering building it partially underground. I've seen houses that were essentially walkout basements.

11. The most energy efficient shape for a two story house is a butter cube, oriented east west.

12. Conifers on side to the prevailing winter wind makes your house use a lot less heating, and makes your gardening less problematic.