Make it REALLY Green

Several years ago, the inimitable Jim Henson forever changed the environmental movement when he had one of his little muppets (I believe it was Scooter) sing “It’s not easy being green”.  I’m often reminded of that phrase in my work (in which I’m developing a plan to make the Boise State campus carbon-neutral) and at home, where I’m constantly looking for ways to save a kilowatt-hour or a BTU.  The ‘not easy’ part of the equation is to save energy while not completely altering your lifestyle.  Hence the tag-line of this blog.  I’m not an ascetic, by any means.  I enjoy my creature comforts and have a collection of internal combustion engines that I use for both convenience and recreation.

On the other hand, I think I’ve stumbled upon a significant truth about being green. It’s easier if you take a long view.  If you don’t mind taking small steps and allowing them to come to fruition, being green becomes significantly easier. I’m fortunate (for many, many reasons) to be married to a renaissance woman who, in a previous career, was a PhD plant scientist and remains to this day, a master “plantswoman“.  Her extensive knowledge of the plant world coupled with her sense of aesthetics (she’s now an artist) combine in wonderful ways around our house.  Here’s an example.

As I’ve mentioned before, the house is an old farm house with many additions.  The best addition is a long room that runs the length of the first floor with a total of 9 double-glazed windows that afford a view of our heavily-treed side lot to the south and the backyard to the east.  The windows bring a sense of light and openness that really make the house a special living space. They also offer significant challenges in the summer, when excessive sunlight can turn the house into an oven.

The southern exposure isn’t too bad, we’ve got enough trees (dominated by a large silver maple) that pretty much eliminate the hellish southern sun in mid-summer. The real problem is the two windows that open to the due East.  This area is a nice little corner nook, just perfect for enjoying a cup of coffee and the morning newspaper.  Starting about mid-April, the morning sun comes directly through those windows making that corner quite uninhabitable for several hours while warming the house considerably.  Here’s what it looked like a few mornings ago.

The East-facing windows, 7:30 AM, 27 April 2009

Not too bad in this picture, but trust me, it’s awfully hard to read a paper with the sun streaming in.

We’ve got bamboo roller shades on the inside of the windows and they’re quite effective, but they don’t eliminate the heat load problem.  THe shades themselves get warm, thus heating up the room.  A far superior solution is to install external shades to keep the sunlight from hitting the windows in the first place.  Of course, you want to remove the shades in the winter when both the light and warmth of the morning sun are welcome.

What to do?

Here’s  shot of the windows from the outside, showing the solution growing into place.

External Shade, 27 April

Those plants are hops (the same thing they use for beers). They are perennials, meaning they return year after year, but completely die back in the fall. They’re also incredibly fast growing.  As you can see, even at this early date they’re starting to impart some shade to the windows.  I’ll post another picture, from the same vantage point every week to track their progress.

The point is, it took some forward thinking to implement this solution.  Few garden centers carry hops, you have to order them and it takes a season or two to establish them.  Barb even took some time to “layer” the plants — a way of propagation that takes advantage of the way hops will root if you bury the runners.

They’re now 4 years old and in a month we’ll have a solid wall of green that not only shades the room from the harshest sun, but also adds a jungle-like quality to the interior.

More on that at a later time.

Zen and the Art…

As I’ve mentioned many times, I’m a fair-weather bicycle commuter.  THis past year, I’ve been trying hard to become a year-round cyclist.  Through the tough winter months of January, February and March, I estimate that I rode about 42% of the time. I probably took the bus another 10%, leaving less than half the time I became one of those folks driving a car alone.

Some interesting things happen when you start riding in less than perfect conditions.  The other day I was appalled when I rode by a retaining wall which allowed me to hear the noise coming from my bike (echoing off the curb).  THe sound of a dry chain is absolutely distinctive.  I’m always amazed at the number of folks riding around with a poorly maintained bike and I’ve always prided myself with my diligence in taking care of my fleet of two wheeled vehicles (more on that in a later post).  But here I was, one of those folks I’ve looked down on. My chain was dry and making a noise that makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up.

What happened?

It’s simple, really.  I use  a light silicone based lube on the chain of my commuter (prolink, recommended by my LBS). It does a great job, doesn’t get real gunky and is easy to clean.  What I didn’t realize, however, is that it easily washes off when you’re riding in the rain. How would I know, it hardly ever rains here in Boise!  It was an easy problem to fix and a simple lesson I’ve committed to memory.  Bad weather means more bike maintenance.

This evening, I took an hour to re-pack the wheel bearings on my front wheel. Again, sound tipped me off.  I’ve probably got about 3000 miles on the commuter and I’ve not done nearly enough preventative maintenance on it. The other morning, I heard a strange whirring/whining from the front of the bike. My first thought was that the front brake pads were rubbing again (I hate the brakes on that Nirvanna). Further reflection led me to the conclusion that this is the noise of a somewhat dry bearing.  Time to take it apart.  The bearings weren’t too bad, but the grease was getting a little stiff and I was glad I cleaned it out. While I was at it, I scrubbed the wheel rims and replaced the brake pads for the front wheel.

After 30 minutes of tweaking (and a commensurate amount of cussing – did I mention that i hate those brakes?), the bike was ready for tomorrow’s commute with a front brake that was noticeably more powerful.

One last comment about brakes and regular maintenance. Even though I garage my bikes and the dry weather here in Idaho makes incidental rust very rare, some problems arise.  In my case, this problem arose so slowly that it took me months to figure it out.  One day I was riding around campus between meetings. I had a notebook in me left hand, so I had only my rear brake.  Imagine my surprise when I found out that I had almost no stopping power with my rear brake alone!

The evening, I scrubbed the rim to get rid of chain lub and road grime — no difference. THe next day, I installed new brake pads — still no joy. This went on literally for months until I stumbled upon the obvious.  The brake cables, inside the housing, were slightly corroded.  I took a little sand paper to the rough spots, used a nice high quality lube on the cable and things were noticeably better. Still not 100%, but safe at least.  Later this summer, I’ll replace the cables and housings (when I pull out the bottom bracket and re-pack that as well.

Carbon Footprint: Natural Gas

Continuing in my series of  ‘personal carbon footprint’, today I’m looking at natural gas use.

Natural gas, the main component of which is methane (CH4) is an amazing substance. One of the fossil fuels (along with coal and petroleum) it is found in abundance in certain geological formations in the earth’s crust.  Its value as a fuel is that it burns readily, has good heat production properties and, relative to most other fuel sources, burns very cleanly.  Similar to coal and petroleum,  methane delivers its energy to us in the form of both carbon and hydrogen.  Unlike the other fossil fuels, however, methane has a much higher hydrogen-to-carbon ratio.  That means that, for a given BTU of energy we get by burning it, we produce relatively less CO2 compared to petroleum products and coal.   Since it’s a relatively pure substance, its combustion is also free of other nasty substances like mercury, particulates, ash and sulfur dioxide.

On the downside, combustion of natural gas produces nitrous oxides (NOx) which contributes to ozone pollution (smog) and incomplete combustion of methane produces CO, carbon monoxide, which is a deadly gas that kills hundreds of people annually.  Finally of  course, the carbon dioxide it produces is part of  whole climate change issue.

For the past 2 and a half years, I’ve been keeping a spreadsheet that I update every month with natural gas usage (measured in a unit called a “therm” which is 100,000 BTUs), electricity and municipal water usage.  Here’s a chart of natural gas usage broken down by month.

Natural Gas Usage in Therms, by Month (2008)

Note the significant seasonal variation.  June, July and August shows consistently low usage, pretty much entirely due to the hot water tank. This chart clearly shows the relative contribution of heating relative to hot water in overall consumption.

For 2008, we burned a total of 737 therms of natural gas.  The conversion from natural gas combustion to carbon dioxide is very simple, you just multiply the number of therms burned by 0.0053 MTCDE/Therm.

Final analysis:  The carbon footprint from my household due to direct combustion of natural gas was 3.92 MTCDE in 2008.

Remembering an absent friend

On cold rainy nights like this one, I reflect on the irony that a man who survived the Nazis and the Soviets and became a beloved teacher, accomplished scholar and dear friend, was taken from us by a man who, 10 years earlier had taken disability pay claiming to be legally blind.

200 miles and counting…

It’s reasonable to infer that I’ve been riding about 42% of the time. Not too bad for January, February and March.