Archive for November, 2009
Elements of Green Homes (2)
According to the U.S. Green Building Council’s Guideline, if you want a sustainable home, you should choose one smaller in size. No matter how many green features you put into a home, a 5000 square foot green home will still consume a lot more natural resources than one 2000 square feet, more heating, air conditioning and more lighting. However, if you do have a large house, there are ways to reduce your consumption of natural resources. For water efficiency, a water conserving irrigation system and water efficient kitchen and bathroom fixtures. A rain water collection and storage system for water plants will help to conserve water in arid regions. For lighting, besides the use of fluorescent lights, one can make use of fluorescent light dimmers, and light managers to cut down on electricity use for lighting, and thereby lower energy cost. 
Elements of Green Homes
Whether you are a home buyer or a renter looking for a green home or a home owner looking to green-transform your existing home, you need to know what constitute a green home. In the next couple of post we will identify the features of a green home. A green home is a healthier living space, is more economical to operate and is friendly to the environment.
A green home should not be situated on environmentally sensitive areas like prime farmland, wetlands, and endangered species habitats. Good green development sites can be a former parking lot, rail yards, shopping malls or factories. It should be in a compact development with average housing density of at least 6 units per acre. It should be within walking distance to public transportation, so you can leave your care at home. Walking distance to parks, schools, shopping, and presence of bicycle routes are all preferred elements of a grreen home.
The siting of a home is important for a green home. The availability of natural daylight will reduce reliance on lighting. Windows, skylights, solar tubes can be used to bring more light to the interior of the house. To cut down on summer sun, south and west facing walls should have shading devices, like sunshades, canopies, trees. However, if you are planning to install a grid-tied residential photovoltaic solar power system, you would want to have a south facing roof that is not shaded for maximum sun exposure..
Asthma–fastest growing chronic disease in Ameica
The Environmental Defense Fund issued a report back in April 2007 identifying asthma as the fastest growing chronic disease in America. Nationwide, 22 million people suffer from asthma. It accounted for 9 million doctors visits, and 1.8 million emergency room visits in 2000. The cost of asthma was estimated at $14 billion in 2002. Particulate air pollutants from automobiles and coal fire power plants are definitely a major contributing factors to asthma. If we all do our share of lowering our fossil fuel consumption, it will go a long way to improving the environment. One way to lower our fossil fuel dependence is to install a home solar power system. With federal tax credit, and state incentives, the cost of a starter 1 kW or 2 kW home solar power kit has never been more affordable. Aside from lowering your monthly energy cost and contributing to lowering your carbon footprint, a residential solar power system will also add resale value to your home.
Why organic?
If you are concerned enough about saving energy to take action lowering your carbon footprint, adopting measures to green your home, like installing a power factor conditioning unit or other energy saving products to lower electricity consumption or a home solar power system to cut down on fossil fuel dependence, then you might want to consider also going organic if you haven’t already done so. A Dutch study has recently shown that organic milk contains 70% higher levels of omega-3 fatty acids and children fed organic milk were less likely to develop allergy, asthma and skin rash (http://www.organicconsumers.org/articles/article_19126.cfm).
Dr. Sam Epstein, Chairman of the Cancer Prevention Coalition, warns that genetically modified bovine growth hormone (rBGH)from Eli Lilly and Monsanto that are now being used in large factory dairy farm milk production makes cows sick, and rBGH is contaminated by pus. rBGH milk is nutritionally different and deficient than natural organic milk. rBGH milk is also contaminated with rBGH, which can be absorbed through the intestine albeit in minute quantities. rBGH milk is also overcharged with bovine insulin-like growth factor one (IGH-1) that is readily absorbed through the gut. IGH-1, a potent carcinogen has been linked in numerous scientific studies to breast, colon, and prostate cancers.
What’s in your food?
While most of us are convinced that we need to save energy, and minimize our use of fossil fuel, the connection between fossil fuel and the foods we eat is less obvious. As we pollute the environment, the farmers find it harder and harder to grow crops without resorting to chemical fertilizers. Chemical fertilizers destroy the soil ecology and crops become susceptible to infestations. So more and more farmers have to resort to the use of pesticides. While our government has repeatedly assured us that the food we eat are safe, but just how safe and what is on or in our foods. 
According to the USDA, when you eat a banana you may be exposing yourself to 12 different pesticides and an apple about 42 with carcinogenic, hormone altering, toxic or reproductive system and development interfering effects. While the level of these pesticides may be low, the combined effect of exposure to multiple pesticides has never been studied. Chemicals do interact in unexpected ways, and no one has ever analyzed the synergistic effects of exposure to multiple pesticides. With dozens of chemical pesticides being present at the same time the number of combinations and permutations will be so great that it may become impossible to analyze in a meaningful way. And now we have the added concern with genetic modified foods some were genetically modified to resist pesticides, and others to produce them. Are we poisoning ourselves?
A new Smart Grid can mean lower energy cost
President Obama is proposing to upgrade the nation’s power grid with a new smart grid. Just what is this smart grid? One can envision it as the reversal of the old grid. It starts with energy being generated at the point of use – like from a residential solar power system or a microCHP (micro combined heat and power) fuel cell. This self-generated energy is typically connected to the local electrical utility grid so that any surplus power is fed back into the grid and credited against the user’s account for use at a later time. When multiple numbers of these self-generation systems are put together in a network, a micro-grid is created. This will eliminate our dependency on the ever-increasing costs and unreliability of a centralized power grid, and replacing it with electricity produced on-site at a home, business, school, hospital or any other building in the network.
The advantages of a smart grid are that the network of micro-grids are cheaper to operate than a centralized grid. They increase energy efficiency and are much cleaner than typical grid energy. They can operate independently when the grid fails or is interrupted. They can be managed as a network to redirect surplus power to meet total peak requirements. And they can serve as the energy backbone for building “smart growth” communities.
Meadowbrook water company sees lower energy bills
Meadowbrook water company purchased a Power-save 3400 3 phase power factor conditioning unit last year. Here is what they say about the unit:-
” We had it installed on a panel that operates a 40 hp, 3 phase, 480 volt motor that runs a pump for our water distribution company. Just prior to installation, we checked the amperage and it read 55 amps per leg. We did another reading just after installation and it had already dropped to 35 amps. We were very much excited to see this much of a reduction as our power bill typically run anywhere from $2500 a month in the winter to $6000 in the summer months. Needless to say, we saw a big drop in our power bills, and on an annual basis, that is a tremendous savings that can be passed along to our customers by not needing a rate increase even in the face of higher electric rates. “