I'm writing an article for the local newspaper here at school in UMass Amherst. I've been interested in green housing since I saw the "Garbage Warrior."

If anybody who currently lives in or wants to live in this type of housing, could you please post in the forum or email me at [email protected]
Or if your an architect (even better).

It does not have to be that in depth, even if its just a quote or two on what you think about eco-friendly housing.
And if you'd like to talk more email me.

Thanks in advance



P.S.
leave your name so I know who you are and so you can get credit in the newspaper.

bump...

Do you think we'll see these types of housing nationwide?
How environmentally friendly are these houses?
How much can these houses save money on other bills (gas, electric etc.)?
What do you like about them?
Why should everyone go out and buy an eco-friendly house, like earthships?

Please help me out, it'll only take 5 min of your time to let the nation know more about them. Which is important when everyone is trying to go Green to help save our environment.

email: [email protected]

Why should everyone go out and buy an eco-friendly house, like earthships?

Colin, after all of the push by the 'greenies', most of whom have never had to provide thieir own financial support, run a business, or met a payroll, the term "eco-friendly" is becoming a 'four letter word' to those of us who pay the bills, pay the taxes, and read about the measures and the candidates' positions before we vote. The only thing that will entice most of us to buy (or build) an 'eco-friendly' house is if it has sufficient operational cost savings and increased future value to make economic sense! You can chant, protest, march, and demonstrate all you want, but we choose with our wallets!! Study hard, go out into the world and try to run a business and you will understand why we feel this way.

Posted By glenfotre on 07 Nov 2010 05:20 PM

Why should everyone go out and buy an eco-friendly house, like earthships?

Colin, after all of the push by the 'greenies', most of whom have never had to provide thieir own financial support, run a business, or met a payroll, the term "eco-friendly" is becoming a 'four letter word' to those of us who pay the bills, pay the taxes, and read about the measures and the candidates' positions before we vote. The only thing that will entice most of us to buy (or build) an 'eco-friendly' house is if it has sufficient operational cost savings and increased future value to make economic sense! You can chant, protest, march, and demonstrate all you want, but we choose with our wallets!! Study hard, go out into the world and try to run a business and you will understand why we feel this way.

What's your name and where are you from so I can give you credit in the newspaper.

Thank you, by the way.

Colin
Try asking your question at greenbuildingadvisor.com
You will be sure to receive some thoughtful and quotable responses.

Colin,
Interesting quest, trying to understand Green Building. There still is not a consensus in the industry as to what constitutes green building. I am a big proponent of right sized, very energy efficient buildings. I live in one.
 
The following is something I wrote last year about buildings and energy efficiency
 
Forward thinking. All this talk about energy standards and what is possible got me thinking about my own family. We can complain about the standards for homes and debate costs, but the fact of the matter is we should be building more resource efficient houses, period. Each generation of builders looks at the last generation and can’t believe how energy inefficient the houses were.

Nearly every day, I can look at a house built by my great grandfather, one built by my grandfather, one built by my father , one built by my cousin for his father, and one I just finished. It is kind of our family building heritage. They are all on the same street, so they all experience similar conditions. All are built in a heating microclimate of 6800 HDD
 In ascending order of efficiency when built 2000 ft^2 farmhouse built ~1890 18-20 cords of wood per year no insulation single pane windows after extensive renovations down to~ 1400 gallons oil/year Built by my great, great grandfather.
1500 ft^2 ranch built 1951 1400 gallons of oil/year, walls insulated with 1” rockwool bats single pane windows. Built by my grandfather.
2300 ft^2 modern Martin Englebrect (sp?) design built 1969 1200 gallons oil/year. This house has ~ 800 ft^ glass Passive solar design (kind of) overheats on sunny days cools very fast at night. Built by my father.
1700 ft^ ranch built as an ADA compatible design for 80+ year old parents built 2007 580 gallons oil/year Nice comfortable house, fiberglass insulation. Built by my cousin.

1050 ft^2 ranch with 105^20 ft insulated basement built 2009 3/4cord of wood per year and a 190 gallons of propane per year for heat and hot water. Built by me.

My grandfather built a new house in the 1950’s because it took him too long to chop 20 cords of wood per year. This was the start of our energy efficiency program! His brother in law, my uncle moved in to the old farm house and kept cutting wood. I used to watch him because he had a cord woodsaw that was powered by the rear wheel of his tractor. It had a 6 ft diameter blade. The house had about 100 acres of land so it was no problem. He eventually gutted much of the house and in the late 1970’s added a toilet and some insulation. At the same time they switched over to oil heat plus the wood stove. As oil hit 4 dollars per gallon plus, the older houses are looking at 4-6000$ heating costs per year. Just from a simple economic standpoint it makes sense to build energy efficient houses here where I live. Electricity is ~ 0.20$ kw so it certainly makes good sense to use efficient lighting and appliances.
The hardest part has to be educating the consumer/ homebuyer that they should be looking at the total cost of home ownership, not just the mortgage cost when evaluating construction. Most people just don’t get it. As a industry, we should be focusing on efficiency with a emphasis on saving money not being cool or “green” .
Kitchens and bathrooms should be built to last for 50+ years. I think we also have to realize that some of the things our predecessors had to build with are not available anymore. My father ordered a railroad car of redwood when he built his own house, shiplap siding, interior paneling, all interior trim, window and door moldings, baseboard, outdoor decking. The beams for the deck were 3”X 15” 24 ft long redwood beams, the joists were 4X8 24 ft long redwood. It was beautiful stuff, clear, all heart redwood, but try replacing it today.
 The question today is how to build a long lasting efficient house with today’s technology and second generation wood products that will last for hundreds of years. We can do it. The problem is can we convince people it is worth doing and  make a profit doing it.

eric anderson  ericdotandersonatuconndotedu

"eco-friendly" is becoming a 'four letter word' to those of us who pay the bills, pay the taxes, and read about the measures and the candidates' positions before we vote. The only thing that will entice most of us to buy (or build) an 'eco-friendly' house is if it has sufficient operational cost savings and increased future value to make economic sense.

These terms have been "WalMarted" to death, so you have to look at the house itself not the language the real estate salesman uses. Eric gives an excellent synopsis of why all houses will someday be "super insulated" compared to 2010 standards. But as Glenforte points out, the "payback" for these home is, at this point not short term, so it makes sense only for those people willing to shell out for future value. Why would anyone use a 50 year shingle when a 30 year will keep the water out until they're transfered to St Louis? But some people go for 50 year or 100 year shingles anyway. If they're planning to be in their house for 20 or 30 years or longer, they will spend the money to build it right. As far as the bamboo floors and other "green" accessories; they're considered replaceable anyway in the shorter term.
Bob Irving

Posted By glenfotre on 07 Nov 2010 05:20 PM

Why should everyone go out and buy an eco-friendly house, like earthships?

Colin, after all of the push by the 'greenies', most of whom have never had to provide thieir own financial support, run a business, or met a payroll, the term "eco-friendly" is becoming a 'four letter word' to those of us who pay the bills, pay the taxes, and read about the measures and the candidates' positions before we vote. The only thing that will entice most of us to buy (or build) an 'eco-friendly' house is if it has sufficient operational cost savings and increased future value to make economic sense! You can chant, protest, march, and demonstrate all you want, but we choose with our wallets!! Study hard, go out into the world and try to run a business and you will understand why we feel this way.

This following quote from a mate in the UK says a lot but it also speaks to how hard it is to make the change................I doesn't speak to "green" but it does speak to how we value cheap over long lasting good design.


What you have to remember is that us engineers are of a more evolved breed than the general population, we can intuitively see what todays actions will mean for tomorrow.
Us engineers has even come so far in the evolution that we can not only generate bullsh*t, we are also reasonable good at detecting it and separate it from reality.

Accountants on the other hand are quite backwards beings, they look at yesterday's results to make decisions about tomorrow.
Accountants will constantly generate bullsh*t, in fact most of them takes to generate bullsh*t in order to prove that they are worth their salaries. Unfortunately accountants believe that their bullsh*t is gospel and will go forth in hordes to follow said bullsh*t.

One example:
To an engineer a brick is worth about £0.30, 10.000 of them is therefore wort about £3.000.
To an accountant 10.000 bricks are worth anything up to £500.000 depending on where they are found and when.

Another example:
Back in 1931, when engineers ruled the world, there was an office block constructed in central Stockholm. The engineers designing this building carefully selected all the parts for the fresh air delivery system.
This system was so well designed that with a little greasing every so often, all the fans would keep on working as designed for a very long time.
In fact, they were working so well that they all were still fully operational when the accountants started ruling the world some 50 odd years later. But then something sad happens. In 1986 the accountants, now in charge, decide that it is too expensive to keep greasing the fans and stop to pay the engineers to perform this task.
3 years later, in 1989, the fans are completely worn out and has to be replaced, this is when yours truly enters the story...

The fans I fitted?
Nah, I bet they didn't even last much more than a tenth of the original fans' lifespans, the replacements were, after all, not built to a specification but instead they were built to a cost (The accountants were in charge remember)

Now, look back at history...
Every bloom and all times of great improvement for the general population was generated by engineers and great engineering minds. No accountant ever managed to achieve this...

Every recession so far has been generated by accountants, no engineer can ever be blamed for that.