[Zarquon]

A decade ago, at university, I was working on a few energy efficiency concepts for office buildings. And each demonstration or construction project we got funding for had "energy efficiency and comfort" in the project title. You have to assure people that they will get the exact same comfort levels they are used to (or better), but since we were so much smarter than others we'll deliver that comfort for a lot less energy. Mention the possibility of a few days in unusually winters with only 19°C (66F) in the office or more than 25°C (77F) in summer and they turn away. Management knows that they have a riot on their hands if that happens. It's unacceptable.

And IMO it's a generational issue. I know people who grew up in the former East Germany, where heating was practically free. Room temperature in winter was set by opening or closing windows. Some people liked 28°C in their living rooms. And some never changed that habit.

[vtsnowedin]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Zarquon', 'A') decade ago, at university, I was working on a few energy efficiency concepts for office buildings. And each demonstration or construction project we got funding for had "energy efficiency and comfort" in the project title. You have to assure people that they will get the exact same comfort levels they are used to (or better), but since we were so much smarter than others we'll deliver that comfort for a lot less energy. Mention the possibility of a few days in unusually winters with only 19°C (66F) in the office or more than 25°C (77F) in summer and they turn away. Management knows that they have a riot on their hands if that happens. It's unacceptable.

And IMO it's a generational issue. I know people who grew up in the former East Germany, where heating was practically free. Room temperature in winter was set by opening or closing windows. Some people liked 28°C in their living rooms. And some never changed that habit.

[Newfie]

There are all kinds of things that can be done to be more energy efficient. Even just simple things like drying your clothes on a line. Yet in many places that is not allowed.

One place to start this is in our building codes. Developments are not designed to be energy efficient or to encourage mass transit. Unfortunately we have decades of such thinking here in the USA and consequently a large amount of very wasteful housing stock we can not afford to replace. Kinda of like getting a huge tatto that says SUE FOREVERE LOVE, then having her dump you. it has left a mark.

The sooner we start with energy effiency the better. It can be in small and personal ways that save you dollars. I once bought a 25 year old house. We got a pretty good price in part because the heating bills were outrageous. Scared people off. I had noticed the basement was the hottest room. 5 minutes of investigation revealed the cause. The realtors warned us off the house due to the heat situation. I bought it anyway. Fixed the problem in about 1 hour (plumbers cut huge hole in the distribution duct) and cut heat bills by 2/3.

Yet that problem had existed for 25 years.

We need to figure ways to be more efficient. Higher fuel cost will enable that. Thus I support increase taxes on fossil fuels, dramatically higher, provided the collections go into reducing ff dependency and even greater effiency.

[careinke]

KJ, I enjoyed reading your vision, thank you.

I agree it is certainly possible to reduce FF consumption to 15%, or less, of present day use with little to no loss of comfort. As a matter of fact, our health both physical and mental would probably improve. Finally, I also appreciate that you take action to validate your beliefs. Because without action, you have nothing.

That said, I was a little surprised that so much of your vision relies on government force, something that is very hard for you or I to achieve. Especially since you mentioned a ground up movement.

Check out "Open source ecology," as an engineer, I can guarantee you will love it:
http://opensourceecology.org/

Highly self efficient (totally?) homes you can build yourself for less than $25,000 in materials for a 750 sq ft model. Plus all materials sourced within 50 miles, with a lot of the materials produced on site.

They use permaculture principals as applied to housing and tool making.

Thanks again,

[ROCKMAN]

Lite - "In 2008 PU sales were pee-uuu, collapsing 20%. & to put it in perspective, PU people didn't buy economy cars, since economy car sales went down a bit. PU sale increases since then, have much to do with fuel price collapse."

And to put it into perspective: you're full of poo-poo. LOL. From 2009 thru 2015 US light truck sales increased every year INCLUDING those years when oil increased from $50/bbl to over $100/bbl.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/199 ... ince-1951/

[Outcast_Searcher]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Newfie', '
')One place to start this is in our building codes. Developments are not designed to be energy efficient or to encourage mass transit. Unfortunately we have decades of such thinking here in the USA and consequently a large amount of very wasteful housing stock we can not afford to replace.

We need to figure ways to be more efficient. Higher fuel cost will enable that. Thus I support increase taxes on fossil fuels, dramatically higher, provided the collections go into reducing ff dependency and even greater effiency.

[Newfie]

We own a 4 apartment brownstone in Philadelphia. Until this year we rented 3 apartments and lived In one. Now all 4 are rented. My Wife is a bug on effiency so we have had a lot of conversation about what to do.

It is a row house built about 1887 and is in a historic district. Walls are 2 bricks thick. LOTS of Windows because when it was built there was no AC. central oil forever hot air heat, included in rent. Window AC units, tenant pays electric. We never has AC in our unit but had to address that to rent it out. AC is a REQUIREMENT to rent even though we never missed it.

Not much you can do with a house like that, extremely little. The good thing is the common walls are almost infinite insulation. The Windows and exterior walls are near zero insulation. Wife put in new "energy efficient"Windows where we were allowed (over my objections.). They made a tiny difference. I rebuilt all the original Windows we weren't allowed to replace. Made a tiny difference.

So we have moved from 1000 sq feet to a boat, under 400 sq feet. Little or no heat, no AC, solar and wind. Good for us right?

No. Nothing has changed because the building still stands and is occupied and still burns as much or more ff as it ever did.

So our conservation measures did nothing. Why? Because there is someone to use the old building. Because there are more people, someone to fill the hole we left behind. Someone to burn those calories we don't.

How do you fix that?

[Tanada]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Newfie', 'W')e own a 4 apartment brownstone in Philadelphia. Until this year we rented 3 apartments and lived In one. Now all 4 are rented. My Wife is a bug on effiency so we have had a lot of conversation about what to do.

It is a row house built about 1887 and is in a historic district. Walls are 2 bricks thick. LOTS of Windows because when it was built there was no AC. central oil forever hot air heat, included in rent. Window AC units, tenant pays electric. We never has AC in our unit but had to address that to rent it out. AC is a REQUIREMENT to rent even though we never missed it.

Not much you can do with a house like that, extremely little. The good thing is the common walls are almost infinite insulation. The Windows and exterior walls are near zero insulation. Wife put in new "energy efficient"Windows where we were allowed (over my objections.). They made a tiny difference. I rebuilt all the original Windows we weren't allowed to replace. Made a tiny difference.

So we have moved from 1000 sq feet to a boat, under 400 sq feet. Little or no heat, no AC, solar and wind. Good for us right?

No. Nothing has changed because the building still stands and is occupied and still burns as much or more ff as it ever did.

So our conservation measures did nothing. Why? Because there is someone to use the old building. Because there are more people, someone to fill the hole we left behind. Someone to burn those calories we don't.

How do you fix that?

[vtsnowedin]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Tanada', '
')The only way to fix it would be to build a new 4 unit apartment building that is super energy efficient, move the residents of the old building in, then demolish the old building so it can no longer be used by anyone in the future.

[Newfie]

But that's just the issue. Even if it were physically and politically possible would it be worthwhile from a CC viewpoint?

To be zero net energy the site would have to abandoned. Almost zero sunshine.
There is energy use to tear down the old house and dispose of it properly.
New site development energy.
Energy to build the new housing.

I just don't see that math adding up.

[ROCKMAN]

Newfie - "I just don't see that math adding up.". And thus the fundamental problem with many energy " solutions". If the existing less efficient infrastructure weren't already invested and we were starting with a blank sheet of paper many conditions could radically change. Just look at gasoline consumption: if all US vehicles were to completely disappear overnight (instead of the current 11+ year life span) the average mpg of the new replacement rolling fleet would be much more efficient then we have today.

But that and so many other "solutions" ain't going to happen because the TOTAL economics of such changes don't make sense.

[Tanada]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Newfie', 'B')ut that's just the issue. Even if it were physically and politically possible would it be worthwhile from a CC viewpoint?

To be zero net energy the site would have to abandoned. Almost zero sunshine.
There is energy use to tear down the old house and dispose of it properly.
New site development energy.
Energy to build the new housing.

I just don't see that math adding up.

[GHung]

Tanada said; "The possible improvements are endless but the costs both financial and ecological are significant."

That pretty much applies to all of the infrastructure we invested in during our energy bonanza over the last hundred years or so. It is also why there have been significant tax credits to upgrade these things. Whether or not people can take advantage of those is another question. If I had needed to replace our windows, until last year I could have gotten credits to cover 65% of the cost with 5 years to use them. We've never used any tax credits for our 'renewable' energy systems except for our solar hot water upgrades - an approximate $3000 investment ended up costing us just over $1000 after we took the credits, even though it took us 3 years to recover 2/3 of those up-front costs. The upgrade cut our propane use by more than half, and we have almost as much guilt-free hot water as we can ever want; a real help for these ageing bones.

Then, again, doing these upgrades has other advantages including increased property values, and of course, overall environmental benefits. Those of us who've dug deep and made the investments aren't really interested in 'subsidising' others lifestyles through their environmental impacts; one reason I'll never go back to being a gridweenie who's lifestyle adds to the burden and growth requirements of our collective energy use. Gridweenies generally view these things through a lens of financial short-term self-interest rather than the greater good. Some of us have set different priorities regarding our behavior, even when the financial benefits don't quite wash.

[Zarquon]

Pellet heating:
http://energytransition.de/2014/09/is-e ... s-forests/

Pellet heating took off in Germany in the late nineties. Going green was one thing, taking advantage of cheap wood waste was another. A sweet deal, for a while. Last thing I heard was that prices are pretty low at the moment, but were close to natural gas a few years ago. That's because the whole thing became so successful that we quickly ran out of wood waste and began importing freshly cut Canadian lumber for our "green" heating. No reforestation of course, that would ruin the economics.

[KaiserJeep]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('careinke', 'K')J, I enjoyed reading your vision, thank you.

I agree it is certainly possible to reduce FF consumption to 15%, or less, of present day use with little to no loss of comfort. As a matter of fact, our health both physical and mental would probably improve. Finally, I also appreciate that you take action to validate your beliefs. Because without action, you have nothing.

That said, I was a little surprised that so much of your vision relies on government force, something that is very hard for you or I to achieve. Especially since you mentioned a ground up movement.

Check out "Open source ecology," as an engineer, I can guarantee you will love it:
http://opensourceecology.org/

Highly self efficient (totally?) homes you can build yourself for less than $25,000 in materials for a 750 sq ft model. Plus all materials sourced within 50 miles, with a lot of the materials produced on site.

They use permaculture principals as applied to housing and tool making.

Thanks again,

[vtsnowedin]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Zarquon', 'P')ellet heating:
http://energytransition.de/2014/09/is-e ... s-forests/

Pellet heating took off in Germany in the late nineties. Going green was one thing, taking advantage of cheap wood waste was another. A sweet deal, for a while. Last thing I heard was that prices are pretty low at the moment, but were close to natural gas a few years ago. That's because the whole thing became so successful that we quickly ran out of wood waste and began importing freshly cut Canadian lumber for our "green" heating. No reforestation of course, that would ruin the economics.

[ROCKMAN]

And back to the complexity of the biomass situation: not all wood powered energy is the same...or even close in some cases. So says the Natural Resources Defense Council...not exactly a right-wing think tank:

"The vast majority of that wood fuel is being culled from American forests, making pellet-makers fat and happy — projections suggest it could become a multi-billion dollar industry over the next ten years — but causing forest advocates and climate campaigners to grow increasingly alarmed. On its face, wood-based energy would seem to be both renewable and climate friendly. Unlike coal, oil or natural gas, trees can be grown, harvested and replanted in perpetuity — at least in theory. And while planet-warming carbon dioxide is released when wood is burned to boil water, generate steam and drive a turbine, that CO2 is also absorbed by trees when they are growing, resulting in what would seem to be a wash as far as the climate is concerned.

Or so, again, goes the theory. In a new issue brief, Sami Yassa, a senior scientist with NRDC’s Land and Wildlife Program, attempted to model the precise carbon impacts of burning wood pellets made from varying amounts of whole trees, wastes from saw and paper mills, and tree tops and branches left over from routine logging operations. Why does this matter? Well, it’s all about timeframes. A pile of sawdust or thin twigs left to rot on the ground will decompose and release stored carbon dioxide into the atmosphere relatively quickly, the thinking goes, so collecting such material and burning it doesn’t much accelerate that natural process. So long as new trees are being planted to slurp up atmospheric CO2, no consequential emissions are added to the atmosphere — making wood energy in this context look better than, say, electricity derived from coal, which can only deliver its stored CO2 upward.

But things get messy, according to NRDC, when whole trees are harvested specifically to generate energy — something that the booming market for wood pellets in Europe is already driving, advocates say. In a nutshell, that’s because wood is far less energy dense than fossil fuels like coal and natural gas, so you have to burn a lot more of it, relative to fossil fuels, to get the same amount of energy output. This means that, in the early years of a hypothetical wood-based biomass power plant, the carbon dioxide emissions are comparable to, or worse than, even the worst climate-trashing coal plant. Eventually that carbon pollution will be cancelled out by new trees that are growing and absorbing CO2, but just how long is “eventually?”

That’s the key question, and according to the NRDC’s new wood pellet modeling effort, the answer depends a great deal on whether the wood pellets were manufactured mostly from scrap wood, or by cutting down whole trees. The analysis included modeling results for three representative scenarios: Wood pellets made of 70 percent, 40 percent, and 20 percent whole trees. The higher the percentage, the bleaker the picture. The modeling shows that it will take approximately 55 years for forest regrowth to recapture enough carbon from the atmosphere to reduce the plant’s cumulative emissions below those of coal. At levels greater than 40 percent, pellets emit more carbon than coal for most of this period. In addition, as the percentage of whole trees increases above 70 percent, the level of carbon emissions continues to increase.

When whole trees make up 20 percent of the wood in pellets, emissions are slightly higher than natural gas and slightly lower than coal for a period of approximately 55 years, as shown in Figure 3. Even when whole trees make up as little as 12 percent of pellets, our modeling showed that burning pellets still produces emissions comparable to natural gas trend line for approximately 50 years. Put simply: Wood-based power could be carbon neutral at some point down the line, but it will take a heck of a long time to realize, especially if whole trees are used in the process. Now, whether that sounds like good news or bad news to you in the big scheme of things will depend on your perspective vis a vis the sensitivity of the climate to ongoing carbon pollution. As far as NRDC is concerned, 50 years is a dangerously long time to wait for the presumed beneficial results of any alternative to fossil fuels."

Thus it seems like the critical question for each wood pellet burner would be the source of their hydrocarbon fuel source.

[Outcast_Searcher]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('KaiserJeep', '
')Imagine a USA where petroleum has escalated 400% in cost, as has natural gas. I think it is a decade away.

[ROCKMAN]

"...where petroleum has escalated 400% in cost, as has natural gas."??? NG well head prices have increased from the lowest point last January of $1.75/MCF to the current $2.80/MCF. A healthy % jump but nothing close to 400%. And in a longer time frame it's at the lowest price for the great majority of the last 10+ years. Especially when it was 400% higher then the current price. Perhaps that's the time frame you meant and I just misread you. But very quickly after spiking 500% higher the price fell almost to the current level.

[Outcast_Searcher]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('ROCKMAN', '&')quot;...where petroleum has escalated 400% in cost, as has natural gas."??? NG well head prices have increased from the lowest point last January of $1.75/MCF to the current $2.80/MCF. A healthy % jump but nothing close to 400%. And in a longer time frame it's at the lowest price for the great majority of the last 10+ years. Especially when it was 400% higher then the current price. Perhaps that's the time frame you meant and I just misread you. But very quickly after spiking 500% higher the price fell almost to the current level.