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Big Houses Are Not Green: America's McMansion Problem

By Stan Cox, AlterNet. Posted September 8, 2007.


The recent mansion boom produced millions of energy-wasting homes with thousands of square feet that Americans don't need -- not the behavior of a society that's thinking about a sustainable future.

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In Los Gatos, Calif., controversy has raged this summer over the city planning commission’s approval of a proposed hillside home that will occupy a whopping 3,600 square feet – and that's just the basement.  Atop that walkout basement will be 5,500 more square feet worth of house.  

The prospective owner says he’ll build to "green" standards, but at the Aug. 8 meeting where the permit was approved, the city's lone dissenting planning commissioner stated the obvious when he told the owner, "You have a 9,000-square-foot house with a three-car garage and a pool. I don't see that as green."

The just-popped housing bubble has left behind a couple of million families in danger of losing their homes to foreclosure.  It has also spawned a new generation of big, deluxe, under-occupied houses bulked up on low-interest steroids.

The National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) estimates that 42 percent of newly built houses now have more than 2,400 square feet of floorspace, compared with only 10 percent in 1970.  In 1970 there were so few three-bathroom houses that they didn't even to show up in NAHB statistics.  By 2005, one out of every four new houses had at least three bathrooms.

Smaller families are living in bigger houses.  In the America of 1950, single-family dwellings were being were built with an average of 290 square feet of living space per resident; in 2003, a family moving into a typical new house had almost 900 square feet per person in which to ramble around. 

Not surprisingly, monster houses are especially popular in Texas; in Austin, regarded as the state’s progressive haven, 235 new houses of at least 5,000 square feet each were built in a single recent year; 41 of them had between 8,000 and 29,000 square feet. In the size of our dwellings, North Americans are world champions. The United Nations says houses and apartments in Pakistan or Nicaragua typically provide one-third of a room per person; it’s half a room per person in Syria and Azerbaijan, about one room in Eastern Europe, an average of a room and a half in Western Europe, and two whole rooms per person in the United States and Canada (not counting spaces like bathrooms, hallways, porches, etc.)

The U.N. defines a room as "an area large enough to hold a bed for an adult" -- at least 6 feet by 7 feet.  That's not an uncommon size in many countries, but it’s not exactly the kind of room that an American real-estate agent would be eager to walk through with a prospective homebuyer.  (A dozen such rooms would fit into a single bedroom in p>

href="http://www.deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,695193773,00.html">this surgeon’s house.)  

To go along with those big primary homes, Americans now own 5.7 million non-rental vacation houses with a median size of 1,300 square feet; together, those second homes represent enough surplus living space to accommodate the nation’s homeless population ten times over. Challenges to the oversized-house trend are being mounted across the country, most often on aesthetic grounds.  Monumental bad taste can be morbidly fascinating (as when CBS’s 60 Minutes paid a visit to the suburbs of "Vulgaria" last March), but a far more serious issue is the lasting environmental damage these incredible hulks can do. Since 1940, the average number of people living in an American home has dropped from 3.7 to 2.6, but the average size of new houses has doubled.  That extra space has gone partly to free children from having to share a bedroom, partly to accommodate Americans’ ever-growing bulk of material possessions, and partly to make room for more lavish entertaining. 

But if there seems to be no limit to the size of the material- and energy-hogging houses built in recent years, it's thanks most of all to that good old law of supply-and-demand run amok. 

A little brown house beats a big green one

The current slump notwithstanding, homebuilding continues to account for a big slice of the nation's resource consumption.  For example, the manufacture and transportation of concrete to build a typical 2,500-square-foot house generates the equivalent of 36 metric tons of carbon dioxide. 

Construction and remodeling of residences accounts for three-fourths of all the lumber consumed each year in the US.  In this business, there’s no substitute for good old-fashioned wood. Laid end-to-end, the pieces of lumber required to build a typical 3,000-square-foot house would stretch for more than four miles.  


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Stan Cox is a plant breeder and writer in Salina, Kan.

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4.5
Posted by: kepstein7777 on Sep 8, 2007 2:37 AM   
Current rating: 4    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
The only good news might be that these McMansions are not built to last. It looks like all cardboard, fiberboard, and styrofoam to me.

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

» RE: You're right! Posted by: henderson
» RE: You're right! Posted by: solitariodude
Two Words- CARBON TAX
Posted by: NoPCZone on Sep 8, 2007 2:47 AM   
Current rating: 4    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
It's time- well past time.

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

» RE: Two Words- CARBON TAX Posted by: dmmaze6
There's more . . .
Posted by: socialpsych on Sep 8, 2007 3:44 AM   
Current rating: 5    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
McMansions also create more impermeable surfaces, so that rain water runs off and causes erosion, pollution, and flooding rather than being absorbed by the soil and recharging aquifers.

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

what happens
Posted by: susanbm on Sep 8, 2007 4:14 AM   
Current rating: 4    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
when the rest of the world holds us accountable for wasteing so much?

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Litchfield County Monsters
Posted by: Sparks56 on Sep 8, 2007 4:24 AM   
Current rating: 5    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Litchfield County, Conn. is second to only Silicon Valley for the number of Macmansions being built. Well-heeled New Yorkers are buying up old family farmsteads and building rediculously huge, rambling monstrosities. I am an electrician who worked on the constuction of a couple of them. (Not any more. These people are a pain in the neck to work for!) These behemoths use more electricity than 10 average suburban houses. Many of these mansions are merely weekend retreats. A Range Rover or a BMW X3, with a Sierra Club bumper sticker, sits in the garage for the few weekends a year when the house is actually occupied.
Concentrated wealth is ruining beautiful small towns everywhere.

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Aesthetics be damned.
Posted by: Urstrly on Sep 8, 2007 6:04 AM   
Current rating: 4    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
This summer I was one of thousands of people who visited the newly refurbished home designed by Frank Lloyd Wright in the Pennsylvania woods, Falling Water, and the nearby Kentuck Knob, which he designed later. These homes lift my spirit, and they are relatively small. Wright envisioned well-designed homes for the masses, which he called Usonian, and some of them still stand in places like Westchester County, NY.

I was delighted to learn that nearby school kids visit these places and learn about architecture, because McMansions demonstrate is that Americans know next to nothing about aesthetics. You can get a bachelor's degree and an MBA without any danger of learning about the arts or proportion or the history of architecture. And, especially since the Reagan era, you can live in this country without asking yourself what is enough for you when so much of the world's population is without basic necessities. We have created appetites for needs that will never be filled as the world around us crumbles under our greed.

My suggestion as the descending mortgage crisis drives people from these hideous, overbuilt palaces: Tear them down!

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» RE: Aesthetics be damned. Posted by: edith
» RE: Fallingwater is Unlivable! Posted by: rk_tech68fl
» RE: Aesthetics be damned. Posted by: Mr. Heathen
It's not the wealth, it's the ego
Posted by: ecofriendlynet on Sep 8, 2007 6:13 AM   
Current rating: 4    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
It's a shame that the expression of the ego is "more and more", when it should be "less is more".

Live simply so that others may simply live. — Mahatma Gandhi

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A Matter of Taste
Posted by: edith on Sep 8, 2007 6:20 AM   
Current rating: 2    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
"those second homes represent enough surplus living space to accommodate the nation’s homeless population ten times over. "

So toss out the legal inhabitants of the larger homes and fill them with homelees people? Envy runs rampant as does what used to be called, with a proper negative connotation, "being nosy". Not every town has new, large homes. If you don't like them, place yourself elsewhere. I'm sure there are some people who don't like townhouses, which occupy less space per person than McMansions. Do we ban town houses? The market will eventually compel these large homes to be subdivided if the economy collapses. That happened in cities like Boston or New York where in-city mansions were divided into apartments in the 20th century after economic downturns.

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» Robert Fisk? Wow!! Posted by: IPF
» building materials Posted by: bluebirdella
» RE: building materials Posted by: Trazom
9,000 square feet?
Posted by: Logic's Edge on Sep 8, 2007 6:25 AM   
Current rating: 4    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
It boggles the mind. What do you even do with that much space? I suspect there will be rooms the owner never even visits. It would be like living in a vast system of caverns.

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» RE: 9,000 square feet? Posted by: quitecontrary
» RE: 9,000 square feet? Posted by: solitariodude
Having to defend a simple life
Posted by: quitecontrary on Sep 8, 2007 6:29 AM   
Current rating: 5    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
My brother lives in a McMansion, which he built after buying a charming cottage just to tear it down, to the dismay of his neighbors. Of course, he started a trend in the neighborhood, and most of the small but comfortable houses (which I'm sure were much better built than his monster) are gone and replaced by boring stucco boxes that lack any character.

What bothers me is that he can be such a snob when visiting me. I live in a very small historic townhouse in the "downtown" of my very rural town. It's just me, the cat, and an extensive book collection, so I'm perfectly content. He has tried numerous times to convince me that because I can afford a monstrous house on my salary, I should buy one. Why? I love that I have only one bathroom to clean, that I don't need central AC because a window unit keeps me plenty cool, and that I don't have all those snazzy appliances to maintain. Most of all, I tell him that the most I've ever paid for my monthly power bill is $100, where he regularly pays $500 a month.

So, who's the real sucker?

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» RE: Having to defend a simple life Posted by: Constitutionalist75
» RE: Having to defend a simple life Posted by: quitecontrary
» RE: Having to defend a simple life Posted by: wonkywriter
Life in Iceland
Posted by: reinaldok on Sep 8, 2007 7:04 AM   
Current rating: 5    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
I recently spent some time in Iceland. Reykjavik is considered to be the Green capital of the world. The Icelandic situation should be very carefully studied. Iceland as many do realize is a very wealthy country and life is harsh but good.
Full education and excellent health care are practically free.
Homeless do not exist - Poverty a thing of the past. Cleaniness without a doubt. Crime - negligible. There are 134 in their jails - (Mostly foreigners caught smuggling drugs). Taxes high, but you feel you are getting something for your money. Yes there are quite a few extremely wealthy people. However, there is something they do not have: Huge monstrous houses. They just do not exist. It sure would seem that nobody is attempting to impress the neighbors (or themselves).It is truly frowned upon by all I met for someone to erect one of these incredible mansions. I certainly suspect that if someone were to build a palace of the type mentioned in this article, they would be placed on an ice floe and pushed out to sea.

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» RE: Life in Iceland Posted by: mincemeat
» RE: Life in Iceland Posted by: Logic's Edge
» RE: Life in Iceland Posted by: AlienSlave
» RE: Life in Iceland Posted by: Logic's Edge
» RE: Life in Iceland Posted by: IPF
» RE: Life in Iceland Posted by: Trazom
At present, there are probably more pressing issues...
Posted by: ABetterFuture on Sep 8, 2007 7:13 AM   
Current rating: 2    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
...than venting re: the size of home your neighbor chooses to occupy. There are scads more useful things about which to wax lovingly anti-choice.

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» Right. Posted by: ABetterFuture
» People will make silly decisions... Posted by: ABetterFuture
» RE: ight. Posted by: quitecontrary
» Maybe. Posted by: ABetterFuture
» RE: Maybe. Posted by: Constitutionalist75
» Gentrification AND urban flight? Rly? Posted by: ABetterFuture
» RE: Maybe. Posted by: tkwilson
» You're aware of what percentage... Posted by: ABetterFuture
Victorian Times Revisited?
Posted by: Bab5nutz on Sep 8, 2007 8:02 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
In the Victorian era, wealthy, or newly wealthy people would build huge houses to show off their wealth. And more often than not, there were more servants living in and working for the family, than there were family members.
But over time, most of these houses eventually became lodging houses, becoming home to large numbers of people. Or they were broken up into flats and apartments. And gradually, most of these places decayed.
Will McMansions go the same way? In 50 years, perhaps less, will we find three or four families sharing one McMansion?

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» RE: Victorian Times Revisited? Posted by: Logic's Edge
Is 'Green' Really Green?
Posted by: snax on Sep 8, 2007 8:05 AM   
Current rating: 4    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Aside from the obvious shift to excess square footage, part of the issue is that many houses being touted as 'green' don't go far enough. In communities with specific bans on such things as front yard gardens and solar collectors, calling a house green is putting lipstick on a pig. While it is true that vast imrovements to energy consumption and embodied energy can be made in such communities, we are talking about the difference between using say 30% less energy than the comparable standard house down the street, to using 75-90% less, or even putting power back into the electrical grid.

True, Solar Electric arrays are expensive, but even limiting construction to appropriate solar design and using solar water heat makes a much larger dent in efficiency than just dumping a bunch of Energy Star appliances and windows into a house can - which unfortunately is still what many people think is the definition of 'green'.

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Wasteful
Posted by: Schroeder on Sep 8, 2007 8:32 AM   
Current rating: 4    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
I work with families who not only cannot afford to buy a house, they can't even afford to rent one, much less afford the cost of day care or anything else and some of them are working two jobs! I find it incredibly unfair and wasteful!.

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» RE: Build UP, Don't Tear Down. Posted by: Schroeder
» RE: Wasteful Posted by: lwbaby
» RE: Wasteful Posted by: Trazom
» kids cost $$$ Posted by: veggiegrrrl
» RE: kids cost $$$ Posted by: Schroeder
Misses the real point - almost all U.S. houses are very wasteful and unhealthy
Posted by: Rune on Sep 8, 2007 8:35 AM   
Current rating: 5    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
What's wrong with America's housing stock from a health and energy perspective is that they were and are being built to such miserable standards that they quickly leak about two-thirds of the heating and cooling energy while letting in moisture that promotes dangerous mold growth and allowing outdoor air pollutants to concentrate in much higher levels indoors. Using off the shelf technology backed by building standards that take advantage of modern day building science, we could build and retrofit houses that use less than half the energy they do today, keep the occupants healthier, and, as a bonus, the houses would be much more comfortable and quiet. The cost of building to such standards would, in most cases, be offset be projected energy costs over the next three decades, leaving the health and comfort benefits as a net gain, to say nothing of reducing the impetus for abominable wars.

Yes, gigantic houses would still be more wasteful than compact versions, but we could do so much more to make ourselves healthier and wiser in terms of how we use and reduce our dangerous energy consumption by building and retrofitting houses built on an integrated systems model that reflects what modern building science has taught us that it is really just a distraction and waste of time and energy to point fingers at McMansions that are falling out of favor and out of reach for other reasons without any changes in policies.

Those who are interested in real solutions to wasteful, sick buildings can check out this report and poke around some of the links on the sites below as a start:

Home Performance with Energy Star

Energy Efficient Homes

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Yes, Americans have pushed the envelope.
Posted by: Sojourner on Sep 8, 2007 8:49 AM   
Current rating: 4    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Is it yet time for us to suffer the consequences of an unregulated life? If not yet, we all know that time will eventually get here.

Big homes have been a good investment for a long time now. That is the pattern that Bush is trying to maintain by guaranteeing the indefinite future for the dominance of Big Energy.

It cannot last. But all that matters is, when will it give way to reality? The sooner the better, since our capacity for recovery from our excesses diminishes daily. How much of a breakdown will it take?

I have based my choices on the expectation it will happen in my lifetime. I'd rather not be around when it happens--and then again, I do enjoy saying "I told you so."

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Smaller is better
Posted by: Sunfell on Sep 8, 2007 9:06 AM   
Current rating: 4    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
I live in a 950SF duplex apartment. It's small, but there are lots of advantages to living in a small place, like less house to keep clean, smaller heating and cooling bills, and a smaller 'footprint' on the planet.

When I eventually buy a house, I plan to get or build a 1500 SF 'palace'. I'll call it a 'micro-mansion', and will equip it with all the sustainable stuff I can get my mitts on. Solar Panels. Water cachement. No lawn. It'll be high quality and low impact. And not so big.

Heck, I might even start a new tear-down-sizing trend!

One can dream...

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» RE: Smaller is better Posted by: mincemeat
» RE: Smaller is better Posted by: constantreader
New Urbanism movement
Posted by: oobi on Sep 8, 2007 9:41 AM   
Current rating: 4    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
If you ever wondered why many of us prefer the charm of small cottages, old town neighborhoods and the like, you owe it to yourself to see this:Andres Duany 1991
It's like a complete college course in urban design in less than 90 minutes

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» RE: New Urbanism movement Posted by: Ahimsa
It ain't gonna work
Posted by: fearn on Sep 8, 2007 9:42 AM   
Current rating: 4    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
I lived in China at one time and always wondered how a minuscule part of the population could whiz by in their Rolls when obviously impoverished people looked for pieces of coal on the side of the road. Inequality and in particular massive inequality has been the greatest scourge since day one. It is un-American but Bush Jr. as well as many Americans don't seem to understand that. It has never worked anywhere else and it ain't gonna work in the US of A either.

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Look at who lives in these particle-board palaces
Posted by: ReallyBearish on Sep 8, 2007 10:57 AM   
Current rating: 5    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
In the old days, mansions were most often build by folks who made things, and they put their names on the products they made. The particle-board palaces are mostly being built by hedge fund managers and their ilk who make nothing. They make money thru "arbs" and other distortions in the economy produced by Fed and government policy.

Problem is, these people and their wealth are already evaporating. One of the results of the 1930s depression was to reduce wealth disparity-- mostly by sending the instant millionaires of the 1920s into oblivion. In the 1950s I happened to live in a house built by one of those millionaires that my family bought for much less than it had cost to build in the 1920s.

Look for the McMansions to become boarding houses or apartments in the future. A lot of them will be torn down. End of an era periods are not pretty.

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The Edwards' behemoth
Posted by: JoAnne on Sep 8, 2007 12:00 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
And that's what bother's me about John Edwards' and partner. What kind of ego would drive two people with two kids to build a 28,000 square foot behemoth. To see this it in wide angle, Google "John Edwards house". I think it's the first listing.

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» The Poverty Solver Posted by: edith
» RE: The Edwards' behemoth Posted by: Axiom69
» RE: The Edwards' behemoth Posted by: wonkywriter
» RE: The Edwards' behemoth Posted by: JPHickey
Dining with the rich
Posted by: mincemeat on Sep 8, 2007 12:36 PM   
Current rating: 5    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
I once knew someone who worked at an upscale (jacket and tie required - and valet parking) restaurant. It was not uncommon for this person to sneeze into the food. As grotesque as it sounds, I understand their frustration in dealing with the picky snobs who came in and made all kinds of demands. Sometimes the food was too hot and the rich snob couldn't wait 5 minutes for it to cool down, so my friend had to go put ice cubes on it for a few minutes. Other times someone may complain that their food was bland and they would require a new plate of something entirely different - basically, they wanted to sample the different menu items at the restaurant's expense.

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» RE: what if we insulted the rich Posted by: jeffersonian
Turn them into apartments
Posted by: ggmurray on Sep 8, 2007 1:49 PM   
Current rating: 4    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
In my town, mini-mansions have sprung up everywhere. It's like seeing the last hurrah of the dinosaurs. No one can afford to heat them, cool them, and no one is home - the owners are all off working to pay for them. But I can imagine a use for them - if turned into condos, in-law apartments, and apartments. After all, everyone needs someplace to live, and it doesn't have to be a mansion.

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» RE: Turn them into apartments Posted by: Schroeder
You mean size does matter?
Posted by: ldasteelworker on Sep 8, 2007 2:55 PM   
Current rating: 4    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
You mean size does matter? Not as much as how well you're built!

Using 1983 era technology (today you can do even better), Amory and Hunter Lovins' 4,000-square-foot home (at an altitude of 7,100 feet in the Rocky Mountains where it gets -40 degrees Fahrenheit) has no conventional central heating and is constructed with R-60 ceiling insulation, R-40 walls, earth berming, R-5.3 windows, a solar greenhouse, and air ventilation of less than 0.2 changes per hour using an air-to-air heat exchanger. The super insulated structure is more than 130% passive solar, meaning that their home is a net energy producer...

The multipurpose dwelling has four areas: offices for the Rocky Mountain Institute ( www.rmi.org ), a greenhouse, a common eating/living area, and the Lovins' private area. Excluding the power used by the institute's office equipment, the home uses electricity at a rate of about the equivalent to one 100-watt light bulb! 95% of the lighting and all the heating and cooling is provided by solar.

Excess heat is vented, total electrical requirements are 1/5 of a watt per square foot per month (excess electricity generated on-site, six fold over usage, is sold back to the local utility's grid) and conserving fixtures are used that cut water use in half as well...

The technologically advanced, attractive, multifunctional, and comfortable building cost (including land and financing) about $625,000 ($155 per square foot) which is cheap considering conventional buildings' construction and maintenance costs. And the extra energy efficiency investments in the home repaid their costs in about 10 months.

In another example: a prototype 1,656 square foot tract home built for Pacific Gas and Electric and designed by Davis Energy Group (in consultation with Lovins) in Davis, California (where temperatures go as high as 113 degrees Fahrenheit) does not use any conventional heat or air conditioning. Lovins says that if the methods used in the house were introduced on a mass scale, construction costs would be $1800 cheaper, and maintenance costs would be cut by $1600 per year as compared to conventional construction.

See Also:

'Household Energy Efficiency - Home Energy Briefs' - Rocky Mountain Institute
( http://www.rmi.org/sitepages/pid119.php )

'Buildings & Land' - Rocky Mountain Institute
( http://www.rmi.org/sitepages/pid174.php )

Energy: 'More Profit with Less Carbon' - Armory B. Lovins, Scientific American, September 2005, pg 74-82. ( http://www.sciam.com/media/pdf/Lovinsforweb.pdf )

'Armory Lovins: Reinventing Human Enterprise of Sustainability' - Shel Horowitz
( http://www.frugalmarketing.com/dtb/amorylovins.shtml )

'Exporting Energy in the Rockies' - Mother Earth News, July/August 1984.
( http://www.motherearthnews.com )

'Energy Efficient Homes' - Mother Earth News
( http://www.energyefficienthomearticles.com/ )
1,071 articles in a Energy Efficient Home Articles' database from 903 authors providing information about energy efficient homes.

'Audubon House: Building the Environmentally Responsible, Energy-Efficient Office' - National Audubon Society and Croxton Collaborative ( http://www.wiley.com )

"Audubon House illustrates a shining example of the future of architecture: a future where energy efficiency and the preservation of natural, historic, and human resources are the key to creating spaces that are cost-effective, healthy, beautiful, and magical." —Amory B. Lovins.

'Residential Buildings: Technologies, Design, and Performance Analysis' - European Council for an Energy Efficient Economy ( http://www.eceee.org )

Pacific Gas & Electric Advanced Customer Technology test for maximum Efficiency
( http://www.pge.com )

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» RE: You mean size does matter? Posted by: solitariodude
» RE: You mean size does matter? Posted by: ldasteelworker
» RE: You mean size does matter? Posted by: solitariodude
» RE: You mean size does matter? Posted by: ldasteelworker
If you want to be free start with an off grid home
Posted by: Missing Piece on Sep 8, 2007 3:00 PM   
Current rating: 4    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
If you research efficient homes you will quickly relize there is only one, a earth home. It does not have to be airconditioned and needs little heat. Google, "earth homes" and you will see that they are the only way we should be biulding homes today.

I plan on building one with solar and wind so I can ulitmatly go off grid. Once electric cars come out and we have large storage capacity for the wind and solar then I think it is possible to say good bye to oil, (well atleast for transportation).

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