• Despite new technologies, codes, and design strategies, the U.S. building stock is not much more energy efficient than it was twenty-five years ago – it uses 70 percent of the U.S. electricity, half of which is made from coal.
• Transportation uses 70 percent of U.S. oil.
• Between 1950 and 2009, consumption of petroleum fuels increased by 65 percent, and although gasoline demand in the U.S. has lately declined, the sector is still about 98% dependent on fossil fuels.
• Coal fueled 41 percent of the growth in U.S. electricity generation during 1990-2004 (along with 36 percent from natural gas and 23 percent from running existing nuclear plants harder).
• Industrial processes use 31 percent of U.S. energy. Chemical industries, paper, metals, materials and resources, and oil refining – powered by coal (electricity), oil, and natural gas, and a small amount of biomass – are 83 percent of this use (according to USEIA).

For more information on Reinventing Fire, watch the video below:

[Image source: Metropolitan Museum of Art]

The press release names the following companies as comprising the 13: Amgen, Aspen Skiing Company, Avago Technologies, Crested Butte Mountain Resort, Encana, Frito-Lay, MillerCoors, New Belgium Brewing Co., Roche Colorado Corp., Rocky Mountain Bottle Company, Rocky Mountain Metal Container, Sandoz and Woodward.

New Belgium already stands as a leader in the fields of energy conservation, on site energy production, and energy efficiency. They capture waste heat from the brewing process and use it to melt snow on the loading dock in their distribution center.

To help the challenge, the United States Department of Energy awarded “the Governor’s Energy Office (GEO) … a competitive grant.” Other collaborators on the challenge include The Southwest Energy Efficiency Project and Colorado State University’s Industrial Assessment Center, which “will provide most of the technical assistance to partner companies, with additional technical support from the ETC Group, an environmental engineering firm based in Salt Lake City.”

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“Cash for Caulkers” is nearly here. Last month the House of Representatives passed H.R. 5019 – also known as the Home Star Energy Retrofit Act of 2010 or “Cash for Caulkers” – to kick-start construction, create jobs and cut back carbon emissions. While the bill still needs to clear the Senate, supporters predict it will pass this summer.

This is great news for homeowners and contractors alike. The bill provisions $6 billion for energy-efficient or “green” retrofits. It is expected to fund renovations for 3 million families, create 168,000 new jobs and save consumers $9.2 billion on energy bills over the next 10 years.

But in order to cash in on upcoming rebates, homeowners and contractors will need to do their homework. There are 13 types of retrofits eligible for funding. Each retrofit has unique eligibility requirements and set rebate amounts. You can read the full text here.

We made it really easy to wade through the legalese. Below is a table that breaks down the 13 retrofits of the bill, along with the requirements and rebate amount for each. In addition to the requirements we listed, each retrofit must comply with Building Performance Institute (BPI) standards or other procedures to be approved by the Secretary of Energy.

We also decided to combine these retrofits into three packages that will help homeowners get the best bang for their buck. But first, let’s review the program details:

Who is Eligible and How to Qualify?
The Home Star bill offers two rebate programs, the “Silver Star” program and “Gold Star” program. Here are details for each:

Silver Star – Unless another amount is specified in the “Rebate Amount” column above, homeowners will receive a $1,000 rebate for each retrofit listed in our table. The maximum amount of rebates paid out will be $3,000 or 50% of the total cost, whichever is lower. For example, if a homeowner spends a total of $4,000 on eligible retrofits, they will get $2,000 or 50% back as a rebate. If they spend $8,000 on eligible retrofits, they would only receive $3,000 in rebates instead of $4,000 (which would be 50% of the cost).

Gold Star – To qualify for the Gold Star program, homeowners must reduce their total home energy consumption by 20%. A $3,000 rebate will be rewarded for this reduction. Homeowners can receive an additional $1,000 for each additional 5% reduction, up to a total rebate of $8,000 or 50% of the total retrofit cost. Rebates may be provided for any of the retrofits listed under the Silver Star program, or for any other energy-saving measure, including: home energy management systems, high-efficiency appliances, highly reflective roofing, awnings, canopies, and similar external fenestration (window) attachments, automatic boiler water temperature controllers, energy-efficient wood products, insulated vinyl siding, and mechanical air circulation and heat exchangers in a passive-solar home.

The Home Star bill also includes rebates for do-it-yourself (DIY) homeowners that are confident in taking on the renovations themselves. DIY’ers can get up to $250 in rebates for products purchased without installation service. This rebate is limited to attic insulation, crawl space insulation and/or air-sealing retrofits.

Another great resource is the Database of State Incentives for Renewables and Efficiency or “DSIRE” website. This allows you to view rebates, loan and grant programs, financing options and tax credits offered in your region.

Finally, new home buyers should consider an energy-efficient mortgage or energy improvement mortgage. These mortgages allow consumers to count savings from energy bills as additional income, ultimately giving them more buying power. Home Energy Magazine has a helpful article.

Continue reading here for more information on 1)sealing your house envelop, 2) Repairing leaking ducts and 3) upgrading your furnace and water heater.

- This article was originally featured on Software Advice at Cash for Caulkers – The Definitive Guide To The Home Star Energy Retrofit Act of 2010

The couple’s 5,600-square-foot home will be outfitted with a host of aggressively eco-friendly technologies and materials: a recycled-steel roof that diverts rainwater to a 50,000-gallon underground cistern; reclaimed stone left over from the construction of Chicago skyscrapers; solar panels powerful enough to provide electricity to the home, charge five electric cars, and still return energy to the grid; a cedar interior cut from sustainable forests (where trees are selectively harvested to minimize environmental damage); doors and windows of Portuguese eucalyptus approved by the Forest Stewardship Council; oak floors salvaged from old granaries; recycled-glass sinks; a recycled-steel kitchen hood.

The toilets in the house feed into the front yard meadow. There is no paint, ducts, or HVAC and it uses no fossil fuels (easier done in California than other harsher climates). Sliding glass walls borrow the Japanese aesthetic and let in breezes during the summer and the Earth’s thermal energy (through a ground-source heat-exchange system that pumps water deep underground to be warmed) helps heat the house in cooler months. Other aspects of the home and yard include no fences so that wildlife can come and go freely, a bio-filtered natural swimming pool, and 100 solar panels. Take a look at the design and layout of the home here.

The environmental enclave is also one of the greenest when it comes to something else: it will costs 2-5% more than the “traditional homes” in the neighborhood, which start at around $5 million. Even though the cost to “run” the house once complete will be close to nil, that’s still a lot of green.

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Sustainability has hundreds of definitions. For transparency sake, I am using the general notion of sustainability as follows: using resources in a way that does not deplete their numbers for future generations. Perhaps the most famous example of this phenomenon – the overuse and disappearance of plant life – comes from the remote island of Rapa Nui. More commonly known as Easter Island, Rapa Nui sits roughly 2,000 miles (3,500 km) off the coast of Chile. Fifteen years ago Jared Diamond, author of Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed (reviewed in Monday’s post), wrote an article for Discover magazine that served as the basis of the aforementioned book. In both the book and the article Diamond details the rise and subsequent fall of the society that inhabited the island for approximately 1,000 years. The main lesson is that the islanders did not sustainably manage their resources. The population exceeded what the island could support and crops – renewable resources – were harvested faster than they could regenerate.

The beauty of wind, solar, and geothermal power lies in the fact that they are continually replenished without humankind having to coax them from the soil. In the ultimate sense of the term they are finite, but on a human scale these resources are in fact infinite. This does not excuse us from engaging in behaviors like green building, energy conservation and efficiency, or moderation. It is incumbent upon us to use the resources that we have wisely, what I would call “sustainably.”

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