Featured Blog Posts – September 2011 Archive (13)

The Climate Policy Initiative has completed a study to measure and evaluate the impact of residential building energy codes on total household energy consumption, “Codes to Cleaner Buildings: Effectiveness of US Building Energy Codes”, was released by the Climate Policy Initiative (CPI) of San Francisco, California on September 7, 2011. Conducted by Jeff Deason and Andrew Hobbs of CPI, the study was done to see if building energy codes make an impact on home energy use and greenhouse gas…

This is a long one, for intrepid geeks and those who appreciate energy intrigue - I couldn't help myself, I'm sure you understand... There is so much fun to be had in the energy world these days, the limits to your imagination are bounded only by your budget.

Allow me to introduce myself first, then on to the meat of hot water, off-grid, and energy monitoring. Lots of links and name dropping here for those who want some nitty gritty how to.

I've been a hands-on energy…

It's amazing to me how we keep chasing windows in the Building Performance industry as if they were an important energy component. They are not (except when they are, I'll explain). Let’s look at some basic realities.

Joe’s Crazy Window Facts

1. All windows are bad
2. There are no HIGH performance windows, it's an oxymoron, refer back to item #1
3. Windows are not drafty
4. Low E windows don’t save on heating
5. Occupants don’t…

http://rede3.com/Why_Google_PowerMeter_failed.html

Why was the plug pulled on Google PowerMeter?





Google’s philanthropic branch launched Google PowerMeter in February 2009. Its goal was to put the power of seeing electricity usage into the hands of the consumer. The idea was born of a study that showed that those that had access to daily energy data reduced usage by 10…

After the ARRA funding runs out at the end of March, 2012, what do we do? That was the big question on the minds of attendees today at the 2011 National Association for State Community Services Program (NASCSP) Training Conference in Seattle. At the same time everyone felt the need to recognize the huge success achieved by WAP in the three years covered by the ARRA finding, especially because of recent criticism of the WAP program in Congress: WAP is on track to weatherize up to…

Voices from the National Association for State Community Services Programs (NASCSP), Wednesday, September 21: 

 (Some are direct quotes, some are loose paraphrasing, and some are what I think I heard them say. Meanings are 100% accurate!)

WAP has weatherized 520,000 homes through August and spent $3.5 billion of the $5 billion we were given through ARRA. WAP is the 8th largest job creator of all the ARRA projects; we've created…

Recently, Home Energy Publisher Tom White participated in an interview with "Replacement Windows for Dummies," the popular book series known for approachable information on nearly every topic. They discussed what's new in the world of windows, tips on hiring qualified window installers, and much more. Below is a snippet of their conversation.

RWFD: What are some of the most significant new developments in energy efficient windows that benefit…

Straw-bale houses have come a long way since Midwestern homesteaders used to stack sod on the Great Plains and call it home.  More recently, 20^th century straw-bale builders were either crunchy, granola types hand-crafting their own über-green homes, or affluent greenies seeking to create off-grid trophy houses, budgets be damned.  In all cases, though, straw-bale has been the preserve of the one-off – designed and built one at a time.  Until now.

One…

Andrew Rudin's article in the latest issue of Home Energy describes his experiences with a PV and a solar thermal system. The results are not encouraging because the energy savings were modest at best and financial benefits possibly non-existent. The real-world performance described by Rudin is a depressing reminder that good intentions alone can't wring energy savings from an expensive, imperfect…

http://rede3.com/The-Cost-of-Doing-Nothing.html

In these tough economic times everybody is looking to save where they can. In our quest to reduce our costs often times we decide to do nothing at all. It seems like sound economic policy because doing nothing cost nothing right….…

There is much talk and some progress towards an elusive premium for green homes.UCLA economics professor Matthew Kahn breaks it down. He uses three criteria to predict areas more likely to have a green premium:

• High electricity prices.
• More environmentally-minded citizens.
• MPG-type labels that certify energy…

Guest blog by Cara Miale

In the movie The Social Network, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg doesn’t want ads on an early version of his social network; he understands that first and foremost, his site has to be cool. And ads, he says, aren’t cool.

Unlike Zuckerberg (well, at least in the beginning), the energy efficiency industry hasn’t quite grasped the value of being cool. It’s an industry that hopes to be popular because it’s right, and it uses…

For 11 years people at Home Energy have bugged me to write a "home performance poem" because they know I am a poet as well as an editor. Well, it finally happened. I participate in a writing group and the last time we got together we decided as an exercise to write about something we have never written about before. Hope you like it!

Ode to a Home Performance Contractor

My name is House. I stood before you empty

and foreclosed upon.…