This past weekend during our Easy Street breakfast fix Izzy was feeling the beat. We entered to Black Sabbath who Izzy spent a good portion of the meal air guitaring to. After breakfast the music changed to Abba, which isn’t as weird a transition as it sounds and Izzy decided to dance her heart out. After the third song we all decided it was time to be on our way. This little nugget of time really brought it home for me how important it is to enjoy life. Don’t rush through it.

The more you slow down and enjoy what is going on around you the more you will understand a renewable lifestyle.

Do you think about your food? If so how do you think about your food? Beyond that do you think about what you put your food in? How about Polyvinyl chloride or Bisphenol A. Both are in a lot of things. For instance the pipes that carry waste water from your sink, bath and toilet to sewer drains (although most plumbers will now use ABS tubing for that today, but that is a different post.), it is also in some of your food containers, packaging of items you buy and in the plastic wrap you use to wrap your food. I won’t go into why you shouldn’t wrap your food with it, the link above gives a host of information on those issues, lets just leave it at it leaches into our food. So here is my point of this post. You might think long and hard about where your food comes from: buying organic, locally grown or growing it yourself and then what do you do wrap it up in some good old PVC or BPA.

Zanne and I have been using Rubbermaid products for a lot of storage and the Laptop Lunch containers for Izzy. The problem with the Rubbermaid stuff is that it really does have a fiarly short life span compared to glass. Our next step is reusing glass containers for a lot of our storage. Don’t get me wrong I like a lot of the Rubbermaid stuff and they are pretty clear about their products and what they are made from and getting three to four years of use out of a product isn’t bad. On the other hand glass lasts a life time if you don’t break it. I will admit you could drive yourself crazy thinking about all this stuff fortunately their are a lot of people out there doing huge amounts of research on all these products. You don’t need to know it all you just need to know where to look. The ZRecs guide is a good place to start. I never trust just one source and always try to check at least three sources. Usually I check the company that makes the product, if they are forthcoming with information that is a good sign, then I will check an independent source and finally some government agency usually from Germany or Canada.

Enjoy your food.

How many plastic bags have you used this week? How many do you think end up here? If you think because you don’t just let them float around in the street that they won’t end up there, or in this tree, you are wrong. The best way to not let them end up there is to not use them. Buy a reusable bag, make one, find one do whatever you need to to not ever use a plastic bag again. Beyond the waste of it all the amount of energy and resources used to make them is just silly. Come on it isn’t that hard to carry a reusable bag around with you, I keep mine in my right hand coat pocket and many stores will give you a small discount for bringing your own bag.

Little changes can make big differences if large numbers of people participate.

I don’t live there anymore but I still own this house, oh the economic turmoil. This was an old country farm house that had little if any insulation in it. When I decided to add to the house, making an unusable portion of it usable, I wanted it to be as tight as possible. Insulating is not as simple as some people might think. You really have to understand a lot of different facets of the different materials that can be used. Partially because I was on a shoestring budget and partially because I am always trying to not throw things in landfills I did a lot of scavenging for the insulation I used. This decision made my installation even more tricky. I used reflective rigid foam in the ceiling with 3/4 inch air space inbetween each two inch section. The air space helps the reflective foil work more effectively and adds R-2 to each inch of insulation. In the walls I used a combination of ridig and fiberglass. One of the most important things to do when insulating is to create an air tight seal to do this I used a sprayfoam to fill in any gaps.

In this picture you can see how much heat loss the rest of the house had compared to the edition I put on. That roof is cold enough to maitain frost, which means no heat is getting out. This in turn means more heat staying in the house and less heat needed to raise and maintain temps. Compare the upper roof done with ridig foam and the lower roof done with fiberglass. We can all make a difference if we just think about things with a little fore thought.

Make a difference think about it yourself do your research.

My father built a solar house in the 70’s. At the time PV panels were not an option but using solar for the heating of water for preheating was. I was young when he was building his house but I have vivid memories of installing 20 4′x8′ copper panels on the roof and building plexi-glass containers around them to focus the heat on water pumped to them from the basement. In the basement were 4 1200 gallon fiber-glass tanks that acted as heat exchangers. Hot water from the panels came off the roof and heated water in the tanks which in turn preheated water for the radiant heat and domestic hot water. It was really a very impressive system and I remember on day it being 10 above zero, after having been like that for a couple days and my father being so happy because the preheated water coming to the water heater was at 103 degrees. In the end I don’t know how much money he saved in heating the water but I think his project instilled in me a sense that we all should participate in using the energy that is all around us to take care of our heating and electrical needs.

The solar heating system my father built was probably not cost effective but today to do what he did would be far less expensive and more efficient. Pre-heating water is a great way to save on heating costs and if you use PV panels to produce your electricity than you will rarely need an exterior input from the grid.

Think about where your energy comes from.

The air car is just the kind of innovation that the automotive world needs. I do not think it is a panacea for all the ills of a commuter driven world. I do believe that it is a great start. This car uses a motor that is similar to a gasoline engine in how it functions except it uses compressed air to move its pistons instead of an explosion for the ignition of gasoline. Check out their site for the specifics and sign up for their updates.

We can change the world.

We need to make a fundamental change the way we approach life. Turn the heat down, turn off lights when we are not using them, carry our own bags to the grocery store, make our homes more efficient all of these things can make a difference but all of these things won’t change the world even if everyone does them. Renewable energy sources on a grand scale and creating sustainable lifestyles for all are a must if we want to effect change on our world. Signing this petition is a way to show your support for a future that relies on energy sources that are renewable and clean.

The answer is simple. I am trying to find ways to use renewable energy sources and sustainable practices to live my so that I leave behind a smaller foot print. Renewable energy sources are things like solar, wind and bio mass. But renewable, for me also includes being sustainable. The two are interrelated but not the same. For instance collecting rain water for use doesn’t create energy but it decreases your use of energy and decreases the demand on the water systems of communities.

Carry your own bag to the grocery store. A simple way to start to be sustainable.

I have been listening all this week to a lot of people talk about 34 billion dollars that might be loaned to the auto makers so they can weather the economic storm. One thing I have heard them say a lot is that they haven’t moved towards fuel efficiency because it was so profitable to make giant SUV’s and trucks. Well if this is so then why don’t they have any money now? Where did all that profit go? Did they really funnel it back into the making of new vehicles. Car and truck sales have been going down steadily for a while now, following the price of gas. And while I believe that they couldn’t retool their plants fast enough to switch from making a Hummer to a plug in I do believe they could have cut production drastically so that they wouldn’t have piles of vehicles sitting around waiting to be sold. I don’t know if the auto makers are deserving of a bail out. One thing I do know is that this humbling experience and their latest concessions to congress could possibly help us realize a world where hybrid’s, plug in’s and other more sustainable vehicles become the norm.

I have never been all that impressed with the hybrid models and their so called efficiency. At their best the Prius and Civic hybrids get 50 MPG. It just doesn’t seem that great. You can convert the Prius into a plug in hybrid and get around 100 MPG. Sounds great right? How about 650 miles to the gallon? Well if you ride your bike to work that is about what you are getting. I have heard this figure going as high as 1000 MPG but I am using Odograph because I like the site. These numbers are much more sustainable.

Happy-Sacks are a great replacement for plastic sandwich bags. These things are washable and way cooler than plastic bags for the kids lunches or for the adult lunches for that matter. I used them for over two years while doing construction in western Mass. Check them out.

Make a difference. Think about your decisions.