Radical Avenue

It’s back to the future all over again for the environmental movement. Maybe those Bronze Age architects with their homes of straw and sod had the right idea after all. Indeed modern builders have now returned to these old school building materials and are leaving bricks and asphalt behind.

Sod Roofs
Whatever happened to the first person to make this suggestion: Let’s move large sections of our landscape, plants and all, up to the top of our buildings? As it turns out, the plan has its advantages.

• Sod roofs, also known as green roofs, collect and store rainwater, thereby reducing runoff from storms. This helps prevent local flooding, keeps contaminants out of the groundwater and lessens the burden on water treatment facilities.

• Rooftop greeneries trap airborne particulates, counteract air pollution and are fire resistant.

• Dark asphalt roofs act as a heat sink, especially when they dominate a neighborhood. It raises the temperature all around. Green roofs and walls do not reflect energy from the summer sun and instead help cool the air.

• Sod roofs provide excellent insulation and last longer than conventional roofs.

• Birds love the extra garden space. It gives them more places to hide and hunt for food.

• Green roofs are aesthetically pleasing.

Straw Bale Walls
Straw Bale houses can be constructed to look like any other modern suburban home on the outside. But the distinctive thick walls create an old world ambiance inside. Those walls can insulate a home enough to completely eliminate the need for air conditioning, even in 100 degree heat. This, of course, reduces stress on our overtaxed electrical grid and takes greenhouse gas emitting air conditioners offline.

sod roof, green roof, straw bale home, straw bale construction

While oil companies and public utilities continue to seek the Holy Grail of alternative energy, smaller businesses are quietly developing innovative new ways of reducing power consumption. The latest devices on the market conserve energy by automatically adjusting artificial light during the day. Several promising technologies have emerged.

Daylight Harvesting
Conventional light fixtures always burn at the same intensity. Manual dimmers have been around for a while now, but as the name suggests, they require someone to adjust the brightness by hand as called for during the day. However the newest light fixtures can automatically dim in proportion to the glow from the sun. So now that funky skylight will finally come in handy for something other than leaving a weird fade pattern on the carpet.

A Nebraska company called Axis Technologies has introduced a type of florescent lighting ballast that turns itself down gradually with an increase in sunlight. According to the company their product “allows significant and sustained lighting energy reduction without compromising lighting quality and can be integrated into new and existing fluorescent lighting without special requirements”.

Variable Lighting
American workers often ply their trade in cubicles or small offices with overhead fluorescent lights that stay on all day. Smarter lights that turn off or dim when a workspace occupant leaves use less energy according to a Canadian study.

The study was conducted in partnership with Canada’s Program on Energy Research and Development, Public Works and Government Services Canada, BC Hydro Power Smart, and Ledalite Architectural Products. Three lighting control devices showed promise: occupancy sensors that gradually switch off lights when people leave a work area, light sensors that slowly dim lights when there is enough daylight to maintain illumination levels, and personal lighting controls that workers operate from their computer screens.

Energy Conservation, Light Conservation, Daylight Harvesting

To understand the importance of energy, try turning off all the power to your home for 24 hours, then see how your day goes. No, you don’t get to jump in the SUV and drive to a motel either. Energy is a vital resource and diversifying our energy production portfolio will strengthen America in the long run.

Protect the Economy
Whenever the OPEC countries decide to squeeze us, they reduce oil production and trigger an increase in the price of gas in America. This wreaks havoc on our economy. Our country’s dependence on foreign oil unnecessarily jeopardizes America’s national economic security.

Support Local Farmers
American farmers traditionally sell their products on global commodities markets. As a result, Oklahoma wheat farmers must compete with Russian wheat farmers and Colorado cattle ranchers compete with Brazilian cattle ranchers. But the high cost of living in our country puts American farmers in a bind. Foreign farmers on the other hand don’t supply power to the US because energy is expensive to transport. Wind farms sell all of their output to local utilities.

Save on Equipment Costs
Oil wells run dry after a few years of pumping. Then you have to pull up the pipes, plug the hole and go drill another well. After a wind turbine goes up, it continues to generate electricity for as long as the wind blows. Wind turbines have a much longer shelf life than oil wells.
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Seeking the perfect gift for that environmentally conscious special someone in your life? Why not shop for your loved one on the Chicago Climate Futures Exchange (CCFE)? Carbon offset futures not romantic enough for you? It’s comforting to know that you can also purchase carbon offsets from Qantas airlines before your next flight to Australia or relax in a carbon neutral luxury resort. The possibilities are endless now that a new kind of green has flooded the markets.

The Exchange
Investors help to reduce world wide CO2 emissions because the carbon offsets they purchase fund ongoing conservation projects. The Chicago Climate Exchange (CCX) first opened for trading in 2003. It is “the world’s first and North America’s only active voluntary, legally binding integrated trading system to reduce emissions of all six major greenhouse gases (GHGs), with offset projects worldwide.”

Reforestation
Forests combat global warming because trees capture and store carbon dioxide. A number of conservation organizations in the business of selling carbon offsets have initiated ambitious reforestation programs in environmentally sensitive areas. Carbonfund.org is one such group. It funds reforestation projects in places like the Tensas River Valley, Louisiana and Rivas, Nicaragua. In the Tensas River Valley, Carbonfund.org supports a 1,100-acre project which will “help restore native bottomland hardwood species to Louisiana and protect over 400 species of mammals.”
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Americans love a challenge. The need for long term energy independence becomes more obvious with each passing day, but we just keep finding new ways of satisfying our voracious appetite for power. Politicians should take note of recent trends, which are turning farmers into sellers in the market for gas and electricity. Here are some examples of the new energy farms in action.

Methane
You wouldn’t normally expect to have a manure broker knocking on your door, but gas companies are looking at livestock waste in a whole new light these days. Pacific Gas & Electric recently opened a pipeline that will deliver methane to the utility from a manure to gas facility at a 5000 cow farm near Fresno, California. A machine called a digester converts the animal waste into energy. PG&E has announced plans to construct more methane pipelines in the coming years.

Biofuel
In the last century, public investment in biofuel often went toward the production of ethanol, made from corn in the US or from sugar in Brazil. Now our country has pivoted to switchgrass as a superior energy crop. Farmers can mow or bale switchgrass using conventional equipment. It’s a hardy, adaptable perennial native to the American plains. Once established, switchgrass can be harvested for 10 years or more before replanting. And unlike corn, switchgrass produces five times more energy than it takes to grow.

The Department of Energy oversees switchgrass farms in Alabama, Nebraska and the Dakotas. Environmentalists like switchgrass because the plant has a deep root system which uses water efficiently, retains nitrogen and prevents topsoil erosion. Switchgrass farmers also spend considerably less on tilling, planting and fertilizing, thereby reducing their own energy consumption.
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