Bruce Brownell's impressive track record with foam-insulated low-energy homes

Bruce Brownell has been building low-energy passive solar homes for four decades.
Photo Credit: Adirondack Alternate Energy

Bruce Brownell, of Adirondack Alternate Energy, has been creating low-energy, largely passive-solar-heated, resilient homes in the Northeast for forty years—and he’s still going strong. Since 1973, Bruce has built more than 375 homes in 15 states, a third of them in very cold (over 8,500-degree-day) climates. Most require just a few hundred dollars of heat per year.

Bruce told me that he’s done enough monitoring to know that even in very cold climates his houses will never drop below 47°F if the power and supplemental heat is shut off. The fact that these houses will never freeze makes them popular as vacation homes; they can be left closed up with no heat all winter without worry.

I’m surprised that Bruce isn’t better known. While a few of us hold him up on a pedestal as one of our leading low-energy pioneers, most of today’s low-energy designers and builders have never heard of him. I’ve pondered why that’s the case, and I think it must be that Bruce just rubs some people the wrong way.

A gradual shift in the supply-and-demand balance for natural gas and increasing shipments of LNG will bring the prices back up, while the risks of fracking continue to be debated

Gas well in the shale country of Pennsylvania. Click to enlarge.
Photo Credit: Philly Workers Voice

In many parts of the country and for many applications, natural gas is considered a panacea to our energy challenges.

Comprised mostly of methane, natural gas is clean-burning, with just a tiny fraction of the particulates, nitrous oxides, and other pollutants that are emitted from burning coal or oil. Because the ratio of hydrogen to carbon is higher with natural gas than with longer-carbon-chain fossil fuels like coal and oil, less carbon dioxide is generated when it is burned. At the point of combustion, natural gas releases about 500 grams of CO2 per kilowatt hour (kWh), compared to about 900 grams for coal. That’s good news in terms of climate change.

And the dramatic upsurge in natural gas production made possible through hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, has cut prices dramatically over the past five years. These low prices have contributed to utility companies replacing some of the nation’s dirtiest coal-fired power plants with advanced, natural gas plants—and this has lead to rather significant reductions in our nation’s carbon dioxide emissions over the past few years.

Natural gas seems like a winner. What’s not to like about it?

Large fines levied on companies making deceptive claims about R-values

Exaggerated claims, like this one for SUPER THERM, claiming R-19 for a coating of paint, are getting the attention of the Federal Trade Commission. Click to enlarge.
Photo Credit: Superior Products International.

Most of us want to do the right thing in improving the energy performance of our homes. We research energy-saving products like appliances and insulation. We search the internet or clip ads from the paper looking for products that will save us the most energy (and money). We look for the most R-value for the money. Well-meaning homeowners do this all the time.

But it turns out that in a troubling number of situations there’s a significant discrepancy between claimed and actual performance. With insulation materials, for example, exaggerated R-value claims became so rampant in the 1970s—when adding insulation to homes came into vogue following the 1973 oil embargo—that the government stepped in to regulate energy performance claims.

The threat of fines hasn’t been as successful as we might have hoped, as exaggerated claims have long continued. Some long-overdue legal actions against insulation companies in January 2013, however, may finally begin to rein in these scams.

Why larger wind development projects make sense

Two 2.5 MW wind turbines in the Sheffield, Vermont wind project. Click to enlarge.
Photo Credit: Martin Holladay

Last week I wrote about the challenges of small wind turbines and the difficulty of successfully integrating wind power into buildings. This week, I’ll look at larger-scale commercial wind power developments.

Though I have long been willing to point out situations in which wind power is not practical, I am a strong supporter of wind power where it makes economic and environmental sense. It is a critical component of what will have to be a multi-faceted effort to come to grips with our greenhouse gas emissions and climate change. 

A fierce debate is raging about the merits and aesthetics of commercial wind developments in Vermont and elsewhere. Ironically, here in Vermont, a state known for progressive thinking and environmental awareness, our legislature is considering a three-year moratorium on wind power development. How is it that many Vermonters are so willing to fight against a clean, safe technology that offers one of the solutions we so desperately need to solve our climate change conundrum?

I'm a huge fan of wind power, but we should recognize that some applications of wind don't make sense

Aerovironment wind turbines on the Boston Museum of Science. Performance has been poor and Aerovironment has discontinued the product. Click to enlarge. 
Photo Credit: David Rabkin, Boston Museum of Science

At least in our neck of the woods, wind power is very much in the news these days. The Vermont legislature is debating whether to institute a three-year moratorium on what detractors refer to as “industrial wind power,” and debate is raging in the nearby towns of Windham and Grafton, Vermont about a potential wind farm. I figured I should weigh in.

As readers of this blog know, I am a strong proponent of renewable energy, including wind power. But I’m also not shy about pointing out situations in which wind power doesn’t make sense. This week I’m going to focus on those misguided or less attractive wind power applications. Next week I’ll cover where we should be heading with wind power and discuss projects like the one proposed for Windham and Grafton.

Don’t put wind turbines on buildings

Wind turbines almost never make sense on buildings—even tall buildings. When I started researching “building-integrated wind” a few years ago for my newsletter, Environmental Building News (EBN), I thought I was going to write an article that painted a positive picture of putting wind turbines on top of buildings. After all, tall buildings can get the turbines up high where it’s windier, and like rooftop photovoltaic (PV) systems, the power is generated right where it will be used.

Top-performing quad-glazed windows from Alpen installed with three low-e coatings and krypton gas fill

R-12 windows from Alpen with three low-e coatings and krypton gas-fill. Click to enlarge.
Photo Credit: Alex Wilson

Having written about windows and emerging window technologies for longer than I care to admit (since before low-e coatings even existed), I must say that it’s incredibly fun to be building a house and having an opportunity to try out some of the leading-edge stuff I’ve been writing about.

In my effort to create a “demonstration home,” we are actually installing two very different types of windows in the 1812 farmhouse rebuild that’s underway. On the north and west facades we’re installing state-of-the-art, fiberglass-framed casement and awning windows from Alpen High Performance Products. These windows, which we ordered from Pinnacle Window Solutions in Maine, are the subject of this blog.

On the south and east facades (which you see from the road) we’re doing something very different that I’ll describe in a future blog.

My struggle to find reasonably energy-efficient exterior doors for our new house

The wood-like fiberglass door we found for our farmhouse. Click to enlarge.
Photo Credit: Alex Wilson

Despite the chilly (seasonable) weather, work is progressing on the renovation/rebuild of our house in Dummerston. Last week, the three exterior doors were installed. Which brings me to one of my pet peeves: the lack of really good choices for highly energy-efficient exterior doors.

We ended up with a solution that I think will be okay, but there is a huge void in the world of truly high-performance doors. Here, I’ll describe the three doors we put in. I hope you can put up with my whining.

The front door

The purpose of front doors, I’m told, is to look nice. But I also wanted a front entrance door that would remain stable and airtight over many years or service and that would provide reasonable insulating value. Oh, and I didn’t want to spend more than about $2,000 for it. That proved a challenge.

I would have loved to install one of the gorgeous custom entrance doors made by Steve Benson’s company, J.S. Benson Woodworking, in Brattleboro. They are custom-fabricated of durable and highly stable triple-laminated mahogany (sustainably produced wood certified by the Forest Stewardship Council is available), but as solid wood, there is very little insulating value: maybe R-3 for a 2-3/4”-thick door.

Ease off on the gas — and other behavioral changes to reduce energy for transportation

A no-idling sign in my home town to remind residents not to idle their cars.
Photo Credit: Stan Howe

Before the holidays I wrote a blog on how to save energy in the home by changing our behavior. This week we’ll take a look at some of the ways that we can save energy by changing our driving behavior. Below are some simple measures—most cost nothing and some even save money—to reduce your energy use for transportation.

Drive less

Leaving the car at home when you could walk of ride a bike is perhaps the most obvious way to save energy in our transportation. These options aren’t always possible, due to where we live, the weather, or the seasons, but when it is possible to walk or bike instead of driving huge savings are possible—not to mention the health benefits. The same applies at work; if you’re going out to lunch or need to run an errand, consider providing a little extra time and walking.

A proposed change to the residential building code (International Residential Code) would eliminate the need for halogenated flame retardants in many applications

For this Passive House in New York's Hudson River Valley, 12 inches of XPS were installed beneath the concrete slab. With proposed changes to the IRC, subslab insulation wouldn't need to be treated with flame retardants. Click to enlarge.
Photo Credit: Jordan Dentz

As readers of this blog know, I’ve come down fairly hard on certain types of foam insulation over the years. The downsides include the blowing agents used in extruded polystyrene (XPS) and most closed-cell spray polyurethane foam and the flame retardants that are added to all foam-plastic insulation to impart some level of fire resistance.

Now there’s an effort afoot to change building codes in a way that would allow manufacturers to remove the hazardous flame retardants. This is the subject of a just-published feature article in Environmental Building News (log-in required).

This is a significant energy issue, because layers of foam insulation provide the easiest way to achieve the level of energy performance needed to approach net-zero-energy performance. If we’re going to add a lot of foam insulation to our homes, we want that to be safe for the occupants and the environment.

An early-morning photo on the West River Trail in Brattleboro. With planned improvements, this will become a great commuting route for bicyclists. Click to enlarge.
Photo Credit: Alex Wilson

A carbon tax, increased awareness of resilience, and more of us leaving the car at home are among my wishes for 2013.

With snow gently falling as the holiday season winds down, I find myself reflecting on the New Year and what we might hope for. World peace of course, and solving the poverty conundrum would be great. But what about energy and the environment? Here are some thoughts:

We will finally put a value on carbon

In mid-2012 the conservative American Enterprise Institute (AEI) made headlines by sponsoring strategic meetings about the merits of a carbon tax. While not fully embracing the idea, AEI seems to be open to carbon taxes—generating ire among their conservative brethren. Also in 2012, former Republican Congressman Bob Inglis of South Carolina, launched an organization promoting carbon taxes, the Energy and Enterprise Initiative.

I have long favored some form of tax on carbon or nonrenewable energy, rather than the more complex cap-and-trade approach that is being tried in a few places, most notably California. As Al Gore said in his 1992 book, Earth in the Balance, we should tax things we want to discourage, like resource consumption and waste generation, and not tax things we want to encourage, like earnings and savings. With elevated concern about climate change generated by Superstorm Sandy, perhaps 2013 will be the year to finally consider sensible ideas like carbon taxes.