Am I Green Enough Yet?

The sage of puppetry, Kermit the Frog, first sang It Ain't Easy Being Green in 1970. He referred to struggles of identity against social definition, among other things. Kermit has been singing the song at a very different level since "green" became a magic word, signifying a friendly and responsive approach to the earth and its environment. This discussion touches on greenness as it relates to environmental godliness in our marketplace.

What's green today? Oh, anything, and almost everything. If your packaging is made from a proportion of recycled materials, you qualify for an honorable mention. If your product uses less energy than other products used for the same purpose, you're our guy. A manual egg beater qualifies handsomely by that standard (now that one mentions it, not a bad idea). Made from recycled materials? Come on down. Prescient to the end, Jennifer Saunders and her Absolutely Fabulous mob had it right years ago. Here's a youtube link to the episode Morocco from series 1.
The opening five minutes are a wonderful rebuttal to all marketing tactics based on greenness.

It takes more than a sticker on the package to make a product environmentally responsible, is the point here. And it takes a bit of thought on the consumer's part to weigh one's motives in purchasing a "green" product. Will it be worth its weight in energy savings? Or do I want one anyway and look, it's green, so wrap it up! There are real standards formulated by real environmentalists to help you choose wisely on important purchases, and they seldom get it wrong. Consider this site, the U.S. Dept. of Energy guide to Energy Star products. Note that the site limits itself to actual energy consumption, and also limits itself to products that consume a considerable portion of your total energy bill. And, if you're not yawning yet, here's a site that helps you calculate on your own how green a product really is.

We dare not expose our necks so far as to rate "environmentally friendly" furniture, cleaning products, electric space heaters, and so on. Caveat emptor, enough said. When claims exceed common sense, and when the ads urge you to support the green movement by making a certain purchase, clamp your purse/wallet firmly under your arm and lie down until the feeling passes. If we take some great advice from Pete Townshend and "smile and grin at the change all around" us, we won't get fooled again.

Hot Water Ain't Cheap

When one visits the Breakers in Newport, Rhode Island, the guide emphasizes that the presence of hot and cold running water in the bathrooms was a rare elegance at the turn of the twentieth century, even in opulent Newport. Huge boilers in remote buildings supplied heated water, fresh and salt, for the Vanderbilts to indulge their taste for bathing, itself a rather upscale habit. While water heated on stoves and in fireplaces supplied the needs of Americans for most of our national history, things have moved on. No American home is considered habitable today unless it features a supply of hot running water equal to all the bathing, washing and cooking needs of the family.
I'm not up to a decent history of domestic hot water, but your curiosity may be satisfied by this link.
What I want to talk about is the hot water that serves your residence, and how it can be supplied most economically.
You apartment dwellers may not know what equipment supplies your hot running water; you may just run the hot tap until water arrives from somewhere in the basement, or from a circulating loop that keeps hot water running constantly, waiting for you to need it. Those of us living in condos and detached houses are probably aware that something, a tank, a boiler, or a wall-mount instant heater, supplies the hot water for showers and other uses. And, since the device is likely powered by an energy source that also serves other needs, you probably don't know how much hot water is costing you.
A gallon of cold water at 50 degrees Fahrenheit requires 640 btu (British Thermal Units {one pint, one pound, raised one degree fahrenheit, equals one btu}) to reach 130 degrees, which is too hot for a shower, not quite hot enough for the automatic dishwasher (requires app. 140 degrees to operate efficiently) but hot enough to discourage the growth of bacteria in pipes, and therefore a minimum temperature setting recommended for hot water. If you like your shower to hit your skin at app. 105 degrees, which many people do, you'll adjust your shower control to deliver about 1/2 gallon of cold water for every gallon of hot water, discounting water cooling in pipes and other things engineers care passionately about. If you shower for no more than 12 minutes, you're probably well over 21 years old, and if you have a 2.5 gallon per minute shower control, which you should, you will use 30 gallons of water total, and of that 30 gallons about 20 will be from your hot water source. You just expended 12,800 btu of energy in hot water alone. Your system, whatever it is, is subject to what we will call "engineering losses," which probably range from 20% to 40% of your energy bill. At an average of 30% "engineering losses." including warming the pipes, keeping a tank or a boiler hot day and night, and running the shower before you step in (I know you do this, don't bother denying it), your shower actually expends about 16,600 btu.
If your hot water source is an electric tank, your shower cost about five kilowatt hours at whatever rate you pay for electricity. If your source is a gas heated tank, it cost about 15 cubic feet of gas at your local rate. If your source is an oil-fired boiler, the shower cost about one fifth of a gallon of oil, at your local rate. If your daughter showered right after you came out, that second shower cost you a LOT more than yours. And while you were in there, the dishwasher was running, consuming from 8 to 14 gallons of hot water per cycle, the laundry was running, consuming as much as 25 gallons of water per cycle, about one third of it hot, and your wife washed her hands, you shaved with the water running, and the faucet dripping downstairs let a pint or so go down the drain, all of it hot water.
If the figures make you dizzy, and I have those days, too, you probably spend between $1 and $2 per day on hot water, between teenagers, appliances and your own essential ablutions. You can insulate your pipes, put an extra blanket on your tank, turn down your thermostatic control until showering isn't fun any more, install flow-limiting shower heads that emit a fine spray, and you could save as much as 30% of the energy you spend on hot water. And it might be worth it. Twenty dollars a month is a savings worth calculating, but it won't transform your budget. Conservation is a game of diminishing returns, a struggle noble and brave, but it bores people when you talk about it. In future posts we will revisit this topic and add up the savings of conservation. Our bias then, as now, will be: the American lifestyle uses lots of energy, and the small moves of pipe insulation and tank wrapping are not the answers we need to win the energy wars. Until then, time your daughter's showers, and complain loudly.

Starting Close to Home

As we begin this series of observations/opinions about the role energy plays in normal American living, I should confess to our own struggles. Our house, 900 square feet of Civil War post-and-beam farmhouse mated with a 16x30 sunroom addition, is a study in how existing architecture resists radical energy techniques. The oak and chestnut frame cannnot be easily cut without weakening the structure; the roofline was set thirty years ago in a previous remodel. The addition is 2x6 framing insulated with fiberglass batts and glazed with double pane windows and fixed double pane skylights. The existing footprint and room layout are not very flexible. What's a (recently freed from tuition, mortgage less than a year to payoff) couple to do? Honest answer: a modest envelope-enhancing exterior remodel. The pictures tell the best story.

The first photo shows the existing old siding (cedar shingles over older cedar clapboards) stripped off, showing original chestnut sheathing applied to the post-and-beam frame with 19th century cut nails. We secretly enjoyed the look of the exposed boards, but this detail reveals how open the old building envelope really was: the batts shown at left were added thirty years ago. The condition and coverage were acceptable, showing very little settling and few gaps. The gapped boards at center are typical; the lath and plaster shown at right are the original interior finish, applied directly to the sheathing surface. Imagine the original R factor!

Surprisingly little rot appeared in the sheathing, except near the sills at the bottom. We sparingly cut out rotted or bug-damaged planks, replacing them with pressure treated wood of similar thickness (one inch, give or take an eighth).

As grueling as demolition can be, working out the next steps was harder. Our options boiled down to three. We could side directly over the existing sheathing, filling gaps with sprayed foam. Or, apply furring strips over the severely gapped sheathing, install sheet foam between strips, and overlay siding. We chose a third option for a balance of reasons. The post-and-beam frame was in good shape, but we hoped to add structural rigidity as we tightened the envelope. The existing frame supported R19 walls in most places, and the fiberglass batts were holding up well. And the existing plank sheathing, gapped as you see it in the photo, made us nervous; simple as that. We discussed the matter for a week, my lovely wife and I, and tried not to look back as we proceeded.

Into the sheathing gaps went urethane foam, through the lovely old chestnut went treated deck screws, pinning the planks to the frame, across the exterior wall went beads of exterior construction cement, and over the whole affair went exterior plywood sheathing, screwed, glued and nailed directly into the frame wherever possible (the placement of the sheets as you see them in the photo was intended to lock the frame and planking to full sheets of plywood for maximum strength). The bad news was that we found ourselves working with an exterior very much like a modern frame house, short on romance and long on flat, smooth surfaces. The good news was, same answer: flat, smooth surface, sealed as tightly as foam can seal it, ready to hold siding and fasteners as well as a new house or better. We, as we have so many times in our 33 years here, told ourselves to grow up and remodel for our own century. A charming colonial farmhouse like ours is a natural disaster when it comes to energy. Some balance of charm and efficiency has to be figured out.


Another round of soul-searching ensued. Housewrap moisture barrier, of course; a no-brainer. And then: vinyl siding (http://www.certainteed.com/products/vinyl-siding)? Fiber cement boards, emulating clapboard siding or shingles (http://www.gaf-weatherside.com/?gclid=COSDx6-v5JcCFQETGgodQyDgCg)? Cedar shingles, pre-finished (http://www.maibec.com/en/cedar-shingles.html) or natural (http://www.cedarbureau.org/certi-label/shingles/certigrade.htm)? Other options were rapidly crossed off the list: vertical planks, stucco, cement or wood panel.


And in the end, charm won this skirmish. The cost per square foot for the above treatments was close enough. The durability of fiber cement and vinyl, along with low maintenance, were strong arguments for those more modern finishes. The traditional cedar sidings, clapboard and shingle, spoke more truly of the house's age and country setting. Since we planned to do the project ourselves, the labor calculation was a category separate from cost. How much time did we want to spend putting up cedar, when either vinyl or fiber cement would go up faster?


The next photo reveals the winner: cedar clapboards, medium grade, pre-primed by us, pre-painted by us, installed with hot-dipped galvanized fasteners whose heads were sealed with caulk. The new windows and doors will be part of a future discussion, but we essentially splurged
only on the door, a mahogany panel model with a nice Andersen storm door (not pictured). We paid for Low Emissivity and wood interior trim on the windows, and the job was done by Christmas. The feel of the house is noticeably warmer, and drafts have been almost eliminated around window and door openings. We're very happy with the result, and the whole thing was done within a modest budget.
In future posts, and in the upcoming website, we will discuss other aspects of home energy consciousness, including appliances, maintenance issues, and renewable retrofits. Let's keep talking. It changes things, eventually.