By Jim Gunshinan •
April 21, 2009
Recent articles in USA Today and California’s Flex Your Power e-Newswire discussed the phenomenon known in energy efficiency circles as “take back” or the “Snackwell Effect” (see “Consumers Can Sabotage Energy-Saving Efforts,” and “The Snackwell Effect: Consumers Sabotage Energy-Saving Efforts“).
Stanley Jevons first described the take back effect in 1865, so this is nothing new. Jevons observed that new efficient steam engines decreased coal consumption, which led to a drop in coal prices. But the lower [...]
By Jim Gunshinan •
December 18, 2008
Do you remember the last time you felt that the Federal Government was on your side? I know; it’s been a while. One function of government, to protect consumers from fraudulent claims by manufacturers, may be making a comeback.
The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), which develops product testing for the Energy Star program, recently reached an agreement with LG, one of the world’s largest manufacturer’s of appliances and [...]
By Jim Gunshinan •
November 14, 2008
We planted several young trees at our home in October, including a Mission Fig, a Japanese Crabapple, a multi-trunk Magnolia, and a Copper Beech. Planting in the fall gives the trees a chance to put down some roots before the winter so that, in the spring, they don’t bloom spectacularly and then die from lack of a good grounding in the soil. We took [...]
By Jim Gunshinan •
August 11, 2008
Architect Nabih Tahan’s home in Berkeley was built to Passivhaus standards. It needs no furnace or air conditioning and is comfortable year-round.
I missed writing my blog entry two weeks ago because I was at the Squaw Valley Community of Writers writing poetry with about 60 poets from around the country. We created community through expressing artfully what is almost impossible to express [...]
By Jim Gunshinan •
June 20, 2008
Yeah Alaska! Yeah Brazil! Yeah California?
The people of Juneau saved electricity in a hurry– when electricity
went to 55 cents per kilowatt-hour
In Juneau, Alaska, an avalanche on April 16th downed transmission lines and cut off the city from it’s cheap source of hydroelectric power; electricity prices jumped by 500%. Alan Meier-a scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Home Energy Magazine’s Senior Executive Editor, and an expert in how to cut energy use in a hurry-was called in [...]
By Jim Gunshinan •
June 20, 2008
Each big storm with a high tide and an
onshore wind takes a big bite out of Sarichef.Photo By Shishmaref Erosion and Relocation Coalition
In an email this week from John Woodward, an Alaska builder and Home Energy author, he wrote, “I put together a working/management group to manage the relocation of the community of Shishmaref sustainabely. They live on Sarichef, a barrier island that global warming is wiping out.”
Shishmaref is home to [...]
By Jim Gunshinan •
May 2, 2008
Your house may not be your biggest contributer to globalwarming. Credit: Jim Gunshinan.
My focus in this blog had been on green homes, but there are other areas of our lives that account for our total carbon footprint–how much carbon we are responsible for adding to the atmosphere–a measure of our contribution to global warming. Our houses and apartments, but also our cars, air travel, and the food we eat all contribute.
Don Fugler, who does research for the [...]
By Jim Gunshinan •
April 21, 2008
These 5 folks are full of bright ideas. Image Source: PiccoloNamek
ACI trains home performance professionals through national and regional conferences and through the Web. Last week I participated in my eighth ACI national conference. The annual conference is where I go to network; learn about all aspects of home performance; recruit authors for Home Energy Magazine; and best of all, be inspired.
Here are a few of the people that I ran into last week who inspire me:
Don [...]
By Jim Gunshinan •
April 15, 2008
I don’t think there is one big solution to our energy problems and the environmental problems related to the use of fossil fuels–there are lots of little solutions that in the end add up to a big solution.One of those little solutions I have been reading a lot about lately is a Drain Water Heat Recovery Device (DWHR). It looks like part of something you would find hidden in the hills and hollows of Appalachia that makes moonshine, but a DWHR [...]
By Jim Gunshinan •
March 25, 2008
Over the course of a week of working with concrete,this landscaping job produced only one bucketof wastewater. Credit: Ann Hutcheson-Wilcox
As a lifelong Catholic and former Catholic priest, I often find myself wishing that the Church would stick to what it knows best: the Sacraments. I wish the Pope would declare a 10-year moratorium on anyone with any authority in the Church saying anything at all about sexuality.But sometimes the Vatican gets it right.Polluting is a now [...]
