You just can’t compete.
You want to build an eco house and do your bit (and are lucky enough to be able to do this).
One element will be solar panels and then you find that Google Invests $280M in Residential Solar Power!
OK, all joking aside, it’s great that Google are doing this sort of thing. This bring Google’s total clean energy investments to an eye-popping $680M.
“I do not recommend wood burning stoves in a building as efficient as a
Passivhaus because of the dangers of overheating, but clients are quite often
insistent and these may be more controllable.”
– taken from http://www.building.co.uk/technical/sustainability/passivhaus/incentives-key-for-passivhaus-in-uk/5019141.article
So it seems that I’m not alone in wanting a wood or multi fuel burning stove in a Passivhaus.
I guess this means it’ll be key to pick a smaller than you’d normally go for “wood burner” so that it can get up to operational temperature, but not cause the house to over heat.
A bit of an eye catching headline “Solar Panels Never Make Economic Sense, Says Fuzzy Math” that first points out the well know detail “that insulation, weatherization and other energy efficiency measures should come before solar”.
Or to put it another way, “Adding photovoltaics to a non energy-efficient house is like exercising to burn off cake – much more efficient to stop eating cake…”. Not that sure about this quote. Eat cake and then exercise a bit more makes perfect sense to me! OK, I do get it, the environmental hit of an inefficient house just doesn’t stack up. Step 1 make the building / property as environmentally efficient as you can, BEFORE you then sort out how you provide the energy sources.
Back to the linked article, it did end that if you include some assumptions on future electricity prices, feed in tariffs etc. the article ends with the estimated “current payback of power-generating PV panels was 13 years”. As the PV panels should last 20+ years, that means they should be a good economic investment too.
OK, the article is about a prototype for a rainwater collector for the urban environment. But why not adapt / progress the idea ?
Full article at http://www.treehugger.com/files/2011/05/urban-rainwater-collector-saves-water-in-the-city-turns-into-a-green-wall.php?campaign=daily_nl
There is plenty of evidence that the lowest per person carbon footprint is achieved by urban living. This is then countered by the increased stress and often reported reduced quality of life from urban Vs rural living.
So nice to see this post on “7 Reasons to Consider Eco-Friendly Rural Living“: