This Town Is So Green It Produces Energy

Some clean-energy advocates think Fresno and the San Joaquin Valley - with its ample sunshine, expanse of flat land, lots of farm and animal waste, super-high power bills (mine nearly equaled my house payment last month) and proximity to transmission lines - has all the ingredients to become self energy sufficient.

Which brings to mind this article I read on Huffington Post. There is a neighborhood in Germany that produces four times the energy it uses, in part through thoughtful planning and careful placement of rooftop solar arrays.

It's not only net zero. It's net positive. Read about it here.

The Nation's Greenest Prison

As I scrolled through the green-building forums the other day, this item stopped me. I've never really associated "green" with "prison", but there really is no reason why those standards can't be applied to such institutions.

After all, prisons consume large amounts of energy and space. So, they're perfect for green technology.

Anyway, here's the story on the greenest prison in America, Coyote Ridge Corrections Center in the state of Washington.

(Photo from Department of Corrections)

Three Reasons To Divert Material To Landfills

A non-profit organization devoted to diverting building materials from landfills has expanded to the Central Valley, providing more green options for builders, potential tax savings for property owners and employment opportunities in the field of "deconstruction."

The ReUse People salvages building materials - everything from toilets to landscaping to drywall - and packages it up to resell at bargain prices. The goal is to deconstruct rather than demolish a building.

Alex Breitler of The Stockton Record describes it as "watching a house being built in reverse" in this story about ReUse's expansion to the Valley. The ReUse People, which is based in Oakland, recently opened a warehouse in Sacramento to sell the recycled merchandise to do-it-yourselfers, other nonprofits and the budget conscious.

The organization has recycled about 270,000 tons of building material since it debuted in 1993, said Kristin Williams, the group's Central Valley manager.

Williams said the primary mission is to divert construction material from landfills, but also noted that property owners can get a pretty tidy tax write off and that contractors, who are struggling in this real estate recession, can use deconstruction to generate work.

Founded in 1993, the organization's best year was 2008 when 200 houses in California were deconstructed. The ReUse People will teach the deconstruction trade through courses. If interested, there's more on the Web site.

(photo from GREENBEANCHICAGO.com)

Green press chronicles clean energy evolution

Green jobs, green business and green energy. The terms are batted around like crazy, especially on the clean energy news sites we follow here at the SJVCEO.

And according to a series of studies, the sector is due for substantial growth -- or could be depending on friendly legislation, according to a series of studies.

Here are a couple of stories offering anecdotal evidence of that green surge. Tony Illia of the Las Vegas Business Press does a good job showing the connection clean energy and green practices have to saving money and providing value in a battered economy in his story "Green's monstrous growth."

The gist of the story is perhaps best reflected in a quote Illia got from McGraw-Hill Construction Vice President Harvey Bernstein, who said, "Green growth is phenomenal across the globe. The expansion of green products and services will have a long-term impact on our future economy and ability to build green."

He also quoted Rick Van Diepen, 2010 president of the Nevada chapter of the U.S. Green Building Council, as saying, "Developers and owners are seeing the value in green building as a competitive differentiator. The bottom-line decisions are becoming paramount in terms of lowering operating costs."

We've heard the same from Loren Aiton, board president of U.S. Green Building Council Central California, who says building green pays for itself and is relatively cheap on the front end. He said LEED certification adds 4 percent to 5 percent to construction cost and a little more if you go to the ultimate platinum level, but the building's efficiency pedigree speaks for itself in the marketplace for buyers and renters. LEED is an acronym for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design and has become an industry standard for energy efficiency and green building practices.

Another round-up of green energy activity comes from online news service sierra2thesea.com in the story, "Tulare & Kings Counties Going From Nada Watts To Mega Watts."

The Central San Joaquin Valley, sierra2thesea founder John Lindt offers, "is suddenly ground zero for the solar transformation of California." His story lists a range of projects: "Tulare County has attracted 13 applications for special use permits mostly 20 megawatts." Kings County has potential projects from 20 to 5,000 megawatts.

We'll be watching closely.

Photo: Kern Schools Federal Credit Union in Bakersfield, among the first LEED certified buildings in the Central San Joaquin Valley, courtesy USGBC CC.

Postal Service As Model Of Green

Anyone who thinks energy efficiency isn't worth the cost should study the example of the U.S. Postal Service.

The federal agency figured it would cut energy bills at a New York City processing center by $30,000 per year. Instead, the new green roof and other energy-saving measures whacked off a whopping $1 million.

Installing the green roof, changing 1,600 windows and other upgrades slashed energy consumption 40% per month. The crown jewel of the project, the green roof, covers nearly 2.5 acres. Nearly 90% of the original roof was recycled and used during the remodeling. The new roof is project to last 50 years, twice as long as the original covering.

The New York City building is pursuing LEED certification, following post offices in Denver, CO. and Southampton, N.Y., and processing centers in Greenville, S.C., and Troy, MI.

As a result, the Postal Service is more than two thirds of the way to achieving its goal of 30% energy reduction by 2015.

(Photo by Sigal Ben-Shmuel/EKLA)

Home star to provide cash for retrofits

This is a guest post from Houston Neal, director of marketing for Software Advice, an Austin, Texas-based software consultant.

The Home Star Energy Retrofit Act of 2010 -- informally known as "cash for caulkers" -- is nearly here. The bill was passed earlier this summer by the House of Representatives and now awaits approval from the Senate. Supporters predict it will pass before the end of the summer.

In the meantime, homeowners and contractors should be doing their homework. The legislation describes 13 types of renovations that will be eligible for funding. Each renovation has unique eligibility requirements and predetermined rebate amounts. To take advantage of coming funds, homeowners need ensure their retrofits comply with the bill's specifications.

Software Advice, an online technology resource for contractors, recently put together a "definitive guide to cash for caulkers." The company lists all the detailed requirements in an easy-to-read table. It also has combined the retrofits into three packages to help homeowners make the most of the rebates:

• Seal Your House Envelope and Improve Insulation -- Homeowners need to weatherize and seal their house “envelope” before carrying out any serious retrofit.
• Repair and Replace Leaky Ducts -- Ducts are notoriously leaky and inefficient. They are one of the usual suspects in a crime of high utility bills or when rooms are difficult to heat and cool.
• Upgrade Your Furnace and Water Heater -- Improving the heating efficiency of your home will have the biggest impact on lowering your energy costs. Sealing air leaks is a good start, but replacing your heating system could provide real leverage toward cost savings.

To learn more, click here.

About the author: Houston Neal joined Software Advice in 2007, just shortly after the company was started. He spends most of his day writing for the company blog and getting the word out about Software Advice's resources. He enjoys researching and reporting trends in software and technology, and has a particular interest in developments in "green" technology.

Sustainability policies proliferate amongst corporations, governments and colleges

Energy efficiency and good stewardship truly have entered the mainstream.

I got an idea of the extent of this when I went on a hunt for energy efficiency and sustainability policies. I came across a fantastically large cross section using a variety of Google searches. I began with government, headed into corporate and then finished with education.

I was most intrigued by the clarity of the college campus plans. Many spelled out energy goals and just how they would be paid for. For instance, Stanford's policy say it has allocated $15 million for major capital improvements to the most energy-intensive buildings on campus and that "new buildings and most major renovations must meet Stanford’s Guidelines for Sustainable Buildings, which adapt the U.S. Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) system and the U.S. government’s Labs21 guidelines to the university setting."

Officials reported earlier this year that the University of California system would "pay about $15 million more per year in energy expenses if it had not implemented efficiency projects resulting from the systemwide sustainability policy.

"UC's policy sets a goal to install 10 megawatts of on-campus renewable energy generation by 2014. To date, 3.5 megawatts of solar power-generation capacity has been installed, including a 1-megawatt facility in Merced which provides about 20 percent of the electricity on campus."

The shortest plan overall is Walmart's: "At Walmart, we know that being an efficient and profitable business and being a good steward of the environment are goals that can work together. Our broad environmental goals at Walmart are simple and straightforward: To be supplied 100 percent by renewable energy; To create zero waste; To sell products that sustain people and the environment."

Here's Montreal-based Dawson College's short and sweet policy:

Dawson shall implement and maintain a College-wide sustainability management plan; Dawson shall develop simple and measurable sustainability benchmarks and performance indicators; Dawson shall promote environmental literacy to the College community, when appropriate, as part of College programs of study and courses.

The reasons so many institutions, corporations and governments have opted to spell out sustainable goals may have a lot to do with esoteric reasons such as making the world a better place for future generations,  addressing global warming or feeling like better stewards of the environment. However, such concepts now transcend the ideals of the activists. Changes made now actually do make a difference -- in real-time cash savings. I read recently about a concept that if everybody replaced a single incandescent bulb in their homes with a compact fluorescent, the energy savings would be the same as taking thousands of cars off the road.

But simple energy efficiency retrofits make a big difference. The payback on many of them is very fast. Those with big utility bills have a huge incentive to make every effort to save money, especially in these recession-enhanced times.

Matt Kistler, senior vice-president of sustainability at Walmart, wrote this in a post on treehugger.com: "At Walmart, sustainability continues to make us a better company by reducing waste, lowering costs, driving innovation, and helping us fulfill our mission to save people money so they can live better. In 2005, when we began our sustainability journey, we learned that taking a leadership role and collaborating with others that share our commitment and passion for sustaining the environment could benefit entire business sectors around the globe."

Sustainability, at least in the corporate world, offers multiple paybacks. Here's to more of that.

Photo: Stanford campus.