It's Easy Being Green

Being green takes many forms and flavors. You can reduce pollution in local creeks and lakes by using compost instead of fertilizers. You can save water by choosing a lawn that doesn't require (much) watering. You can forego having pets or children because they require food and fart CO2 and CH4. You can spend 1000s on a solar panel that might maybe if you're lucky one day pay for itself.

One of the main areas though where you can think big on being green is how to reduce the energy you use each day. 

Taking a look at the big picture looks something like this:

Just like when budgeting when trying to save, you should start with the big pieces. And when talking about Energy Use in the United States the big pieces are Electric Power and Transportation.

Electric Power:

When looking at your home you can do things like change the lightbulbs, or get more efficient appliances, or upgrading from a plasma TV, and while they help some the actual benefit is not nearly what the companies that market those products would lead you to believe (those 3 are responsible for only about 25% of home energy usage). 

Q: So where does the majority of power go in your home?

A: Heating and Cooling (cooling's the big one in Texas)

Step 1: Adjust the temperature. 

In the summer one thing that can have a large affect by getting screens, opening windows and using fans. You might well save 30% on your bills.

This winter one thing we used was small space heaters in the rooms we were in (living and bedroom) instead of heating the whole house. The heaters paid for themselves within a month, and by the end of the winter we were not only more comfortable than any year prior, but we had also saved about 30% on our heating bill.

Q2: But even that is just an incremental adjustment. So how can I make a big change?

A2: Get a smaller house. Even the greenest of homes if it's very large will suck way more power than a smaller and less efficient home. 

Step 2: Live in a smaller house

We actively made the choice to live in a smallish 1000 sqft home, and while we have a 20 year old AC, and single-pane windows, and no insulation, I'm continually baffled at hearing about how much some other coworkers who live in ginormous houses spend on electricity. Despite that they have the latest split-unit ACs, double- or tripple-paned windows, and great insulation. The simple fact is if you're trying to heat and cool a 3000 sqft house it is going to take a lot of energy. But if you have a tiny house it will only take a tiny bit of energy to heat and cool.

There are other 'green' benefits too. Such as 60 sqft of tile for your bathroom is way less expensive and greener than having to buy 600 sqft. You're not filling room upon room with new furnishings, and since most small homes are older you're not destroying land to put your house on it.

Transportation

The US is built for cars, I get that. There's not really an easy way to avoid them, but there are a few things you can do.

Step 1: Live, work, and play in the same area. 

If you have an hour commute you're using a lot of fuel. For comparison person A drives a Prius and lives 40 miles away; person B drives a jacked-up monster-truck wannabe and lives nearby-ish at only 3 miles away. So who's being greener? In this case the monster truck actually produces both less smog and less smug.

Step 2: Use alternative transport when possible

While not possible for everybody I try to bike in a few times a week to improve my health and stretch my gas money. Additionally though, think about not using your car when you're at home. Can you walk to that store instead? Can you bike down to that bar you like instead of drive? (Plus you'll be less likely to worry about cops on the way home) On the weekend can you make a day-long excursion downtown on your bike instead of driving? (Think of how much time you'll save trying to find the elusive free street parking!)

Every time you choose to leave a 3000+ lbs piece of steel at home you're saving that much fuel, and often you're getting to spend more quality time with the people you're traveling with, getting some exercise, and soaking in the city and sights around you.

Conclusion:

When it comes to energy usage if you're going to go green you should aim for the big targets. And often it's the choices we make of where and how we live that really have the greatest impact.

Remodeling

In case you didn't know we bought a house. Long story short, the only way we could afford where we wanted to live was to get a dump of a place and fix it up. So the following will be a little tribute to the work that's been done. And keep in mind for every half-finished piece that means there was TONS of work to be done as we found out every step of the way. It's like the previous owners were dead set on making repairing the place be as difficult as possible for the first person that wanted to come in and do it right.

Here are some of the major projects:
The Foundation:
Before - The previous owners decided it would be a great idea to have the washing machine and dryer in the kitchen. But when they made the piping, they obviously hired the cheapest labor possible. That resulted in the water lines being wrapped around the foundation. As all water lines do, they ended up leaking. Now instead of fixing the issue, they just covered the bad parts with a sheet of plywood and left everything to rot, and the house slowly sank into the rot.

After - Jacked up the house to take the load off of the beams. Cut out all the rot. Replaced sections with cedar 2x6s and then lowered the house back into place. Everything is well and quite sturdy now.


Turning the Kitchen Wall into a Bar:
Before - Kitchen was really separated from the rest of the house. We mapped out the place where we wanted to have open with blue tape. Once we had a good idea of the opening we put in a support wall to take some of the load off of the kitchen wall (the kitchen wall was a load-bearing wall).

During - Took our all the Sheetrock and paneling. Tried to do the Kool-Aid Man impersonation, but instead got whacked on the head with a big chunk of Sheetrock. Once everything was cleared out we began cutting out the load-bearing pieces.

After - After much muscling and sledgehammering we beat the support beam into place and then secured it to the sets of 2x4s on each end with pieces of metal. Then I built up a half wall and the Sheetrock guys came and made it look like a real bar.


The Bathroom:
Before - This was disgusting. The tub was filthy and rotted out, the fixtures were all dingy and the cheapest things money could buy, and there was a nice fat roach in the tub for us.


During - We tore out everything to the studs, replaced the areas of subfloor that had rotted out, put Hardy-backer over everything, replaced most of the pipes coming up from the floor, and found out that 2008-inches are evidently bigger than 1950-inches because the old 60" tub was about 1" shorter than the new 60" tub.

After - The Wife worked her tail off and did a great job with the tiling. We got a super-efficient toilet that actually flushes well, and the whole room looks clean and fresh...just like she wanted.


There's still lots to do, but it's great to see some of the things that we've done with the place and we can't wait to finish up a few of the projects we're currently working on.

Call me Luigi

Up to this point all I've done on my new house is destroy things. Rip out walls, cut out floors, sledgehammer a tub, etc. That all ended today. Today I got under my house, I took a reciprocating saw to the fresh-water pipes and entered the point of no return. I then got really worried though because the 50 year old pipes would not unscrew themselves. I pried, twisted, squeezed, pulled and did everything I could to get the old galvanized piping to budge.

Then with one last ditch effort I put everything I had into it and it moved! I couldn't believe it!

I then managed to unscrew the old pipes and see the 50 years of buildup within them. I then cleaned it all up, put on some plumbers tape, screwed on one half of the connector, went out and sweated some copper pipes for the other half, joined the two halves with a dielectric union, hooked up an entire manifold system that I built for the cold water, turned the water back on and...it worked! Everything stayed together, not a single thing leaked, it was beautiful. And I felt like such a man..

Now all I have to do is start cutting out some more of the old pipes and replacing them with good copper piping, then connect everything to my manifold and to the brand new tankless water heater and then I'll have all new, non-corroded, no more rust in the pipes, can turn everything off in the bath or kitchen independently, piping. I can't wait! Plus, all of this is currently costing less than having a real plumber come and simply raise my shower head. Go DIY!