Personal energy

When I was in Chicago, I rented a bike for the week (fabulous lakeside path).  At night, I used my new LED lighting system with a Dinotte tail light. This tiny LED light is just blinding (do NOT use in a paceline), even though it is only a few watts.

Back home in Virginia, I have been using the headlight version for a flashlight. What it would be like to bring lighting down to a personal level? Not “task lighting”, where the light is fixed at a station, but light that follows you around. Even with our use of efficient, compact fluorescents in my house, we probably have 500 watts of lighting on all the time. Now, I look even more like a dork wearing a headlight, but 3 watts is way less than 500-1000 watts. OK, 12 watts since there are 4 of us.

Yes, it is unrealistic to try to convince my family (let alone yours) to use headlights, plus there is glare. Still, maybe we can come up with better controls on the light, and de-dorkify [sic] it. This made me think about electric sweaters versus home heating systems. If it is 30F outside, and I turn the stat to 50F instead of 70F, I just chopped 50% off the heating bill (roughly). I know that there are some vendors of heated (motorcycle) clothing, but I have never tried any. Yet.

GreenBuild Chicago

I started my business to do solar design 25 years ago. That didn’t work out financially, so I wound up doing “normal” mechanical and electrical engineering. I’ve missed the warm glow I get from solar design – though I certainly don’t miss starving. The recent emphasis on environmental issues has been calling me, so I went to Chicago, and warmed up to green construction at Greenbuild, USGBC’s annual conference a few weeks ago.

The USBGC’s LEED protocol still has gaping holes in it (e.g, you can pave a wetland or not save energy or both, and still have a LEED building). Still, it’s a good start on a real life effort to help the planet without excessive sacrifice. Yes, green building practices cost more up front (no matter what Rick Fedrizzi might preach), but green practices save that money back over the life of the building. Nervous business owners should see the movie about a developer’s building in Boise: “Green is the Color of Money“. Or just think about the fact that the GreenBuild Conference had 12,000 people at it last year, and over 25,000 people this year. In a year when construction is down dramatically nationwide, the dollars spent at GreenBuild doubled.

Bill Clinton’s speech at the conference was great (you need to fast fwd 75% in that video link to get to him, though). Clinton persuasively argued the importance of the green building movement being economically sound, and working with China and India to achieve economic success without burning up the planet. “This is not a big bottle of Castor oil we’re being asked to drink…. This is the greatest economic opportunity that our country has had to mobilize .. since we mobilized for WWII.” My dad fought in WWII, and I am quite sure he would have found green building more fun than fighting in North Africa. So, let’s not pat ourselves on the back quite that much, but he didn’t save the planet so I could burn it up. We’re going green, if we possibly can. The thought energizes me, gets me up in the morning, and helps me charge through the day. Let’s go.