By Jim Gunshinan •
March 10, 2008
What do you think life will be like when gasoline costs $15 per gallon?
That’s the question asked of a group of scientists, sociologists, others, and myself who gathered at the American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy(ACEEE) Summer Study in 2006. (ACEEE has really great resources for consumers on its Web site, including energy efficiency ratings for cars and appliances.) The Summer Study is on my mind because every two years ACEEE hires Home Energy to [...]
By Jim Gunshinan •
February 8, 2008
Don’t Sweat the Switch from Analog to Digital TV Broadcasting. The Government Will Rescue Your Old TV. Mostly.What does this have to do with energy conservation? Read on.Every old TV will be new again–for about $10.Photo credit: Human Productivity Lab,licensed through Creative Commons.When I was still new to the Bay Area, I lived in a one-room apartment near the Gourmet Ghetto in Berkeley. I was working at Black Oak Books and spent many a late night after work [...]
By Jim Gunshinan •
January 10, 2008
It would be easy to think that the 2007 Energy Bill, signed by President Bush at the end of last year, was all about automotive fuel economy. The legislation that requires fleetwide average fuel economy for cars and light trucks to reach 35 miles per gallon by 2030 has generated a lot of buzz. On the negative side, the lack of strong support for renewable fuels such as wind and solar has generated some buzz as well. I cannot find [...]
By Jim Gunshinan •
January 2, 2008
December 28th, 2007 by Jim Gunshinan
Broke Your CFL? Don’t Panic!
The typical dose of mercury in a CFL is about the sizeof a pen tip
(circled in red), and these doses have been getting smaller and smaller.
(Photo provided by EPA.)
Australia has already begun to phase out the incandescent light bulb,
and the energy legislation recently signed by President Bush has
begun that process in the United States. Every time I turnaround,
it seems, someone is handing me a brand new
compact [...]
By Jim Gunshinan •
November 16, 2007
The California Energy Commission asked the Davis Energy Group in Sacramento to evaluate new home construction in California a few years ago. The following excerpt from Home Energy Magazine tells you what they found.”The increasing architectural complexity of new homes requires greater vigilance on the part of framers, insulators, and drywall contractors to create a single thermal/pressure boundary between conditioned and unconditioned spaces. The more complex the design of the home, the [...]
By Jim Gunshinan •
November 8, 2007
In the Midwest and Northeast United States, homeowners are anticipating increased fuel oil costs this coming winter. Here in California, we don’t face their kind of extreme weather (in my freshman year at Notre Dame, in South Bend, Indiana, I woke up one morning in January to -250F weather with the prospect of a one mile walk to a math class–it took me several months to thaw). [...]
