I recently became aware of a home energy-saving device known as the ‘whole house fan’. In hot summer climates, this device helps your air conditioning work a lot less, which is especially useful if your house is the size of the Buffalo, NY train depot pictured above. But even if your house is much smaller, whole house fans can lower your electrical or gas usage significantly. Since electricity is produced primarily by fossil fuels and gas is a fossil fuel, you are lowering your carbon footprint and saving money!

The whole house fan is installed in your attic where much of the home’s hot air is trapped. When activated, it exhausts the hot attic air to the outside while pulling in cooler air back into the attic. Simple! However, you want to do this when the air outside is colder than the air in your attic - like in the evenings when you get home from work or school. This quickly cools down your house and uses less energy than your air conditioning. Then if you want to run the air conditioner to bring the temperature even lower, your A/C unit doesn’t need to work as hard and cuts off sooner. This saves energy and money! Make sure the installers build in a temperature shutoff gauge or timed dial so the fan doesn’t run all night.

Prices range from $1,000-$1,600, including installation. According to my manufacturer, a whole house fan can pay for itself over 2-3 summer seasons! Compare that with solar panels, which cost a lot more to purchase and can take 7 years or more to pay off, and the whole house fan becomes a no-brainer.

And if you ever sell your home, don’t forget to include the whole house fan and your historical cost savings in the real estate marketing materials (but don’t guarantee it!). The buyers will be able to enjoy the green energy savings too - lowering their costs of ownership.

Much has been said about the LEED certification for buildings, Energy Star appliances and other energy saving systems for the home or apartment. But little has been said about choosing locations that reduce your carbon footprint until now. WalkScore helps you determine the green factor of any location. Their algorithm includes proximity to grocery stores, restaurants, coffee shops, bars, schools, parks and more. Plus they map the location and show you distances to these amenities. Now you can choose housing based on how little you need to use your car. Who needs a gym membership when you got Walkscore?

Just joined CarrotMob at Facebook. Works like this…competing businesses bid for the CarrotMob to visit their store and spend money. Whomever bids the highest percentage of their profits to greening up their facility wins! A liquor store recently had a couple hundred C-mobbers spend over $9000 in a few hours and became part of their music video. Since the winning bid was 22%, the liquor store will be implementing $2200 worth of green improvements! Why not start this up in your community?

Diapers. 20 billion/year in our landfills. 500 years to decompose. Why not 500 hours? www.Gdiapers.com.

A letter to the owner of 19moons.com :
My publicist gave me a pair of your beauty-on-the-inside watch cufflinks and they are so groovy! I wore them to Leah Garchik’s book signing last week and had several admirers asking about the time. I just wanted to congratulate you for your conservation consciousness and crafty savvy.

2005 Silver Ford Escape Hybrid Green SUV All Wheel Drive

Go Green with room for the kids and all their stuff on your way to Squaw Valley for a pow-pow day!

Roominess: Seats 5 people comfortably with good leg room and ample trunk space. Seats fold down flat in the back and there is a roof rack for additional storage space.

Fuel Savings: I saw an average of approximately 30 miles per gallon fuel efficiency - lower for hill driving, higher on the flats and in the city. If you drive 70 miles roundtrip each day to work, 250 days a year, pay $3/gallon at the pump and:

you get 20 MPG now, you may experience $875 gas savings per year
you get 15 MPG now, you may experience $1750 gas savings per year
you get 10 MPG now, you may experience $3500 gas savings per year

Engine Power: A traditional gasoline-powered 2.3L I4 Atkinson Cycle Engine and a hidden-rechargeable battery that works together with the combustion engine to improve fuel efficiency. Most of my driving was highway so if you are a city driver, you can expect better MPG than I experienced. The Reason? When you come to a stoplight the engine turns off. If you ease the gas pedal down to accelerate, the SUV runs exclusively on battery power until the computer decides more power is needed (over 25-30 MPH or when you need some quick zip).

Factory Warranty: 3yrs/36,000 miles overall and 8 years/100,000 miles on Hybrid components.

Extended Service Plan (Premium Care): 5yrs/48,000 miles overall (cost me $1500). This policy will be transferred at time of sale at my cost ($50).

Mileage: Less than 32,000 miles and was serviced recently. I can provide all records.

Exterior: Excellent condition. The silver color hides dirt well so you don’t need to wash as often - a plus for the planet and your pocketbook. There is a small dent on the tailgate (as shown in the picture) which I can fix before transferring ownership or lower the asking price if you want to do it yourself.

Features: All-Wheel Drive, Navigation System, Grey Leather Seats, Roof Rack, Privacy Glass, Cargo Cover, 110v Outlet, Alloy Wheels, Keyless Entry, Alarm, Fog Lights, Power Door Locks, Power Seat, Power Windows, Power Steering, Alloy Wheels, Cruise Control, Dual Front Air Bags, Premium Sound, ABS (4-Wheel), Tilt Wheel, Multi Compact Disc, Heat/Air Conditioning, and AM/FM Stereo.

An article on the 2005 Ford Escape Hybrid:
http://trucks.about.com/od/suvreviews/fr/05_hybridescape.htm

Asking price $22,000. To test drive my Escape Hybrid, please email me at MongoSpeaks@HowToConserve.com. I’m located in Contra Costa County, California.

Thank you,
Eric
MongoSpeaks@HowToConserve.com

Finally made it back to California. I stopped on my way through the Southern California foothills of the Sierra Nevada mountain range and found a local farm with some sweet pluots, where I picked up some homecoming gifts. See, I’m not the scrooge I make myself out to be. I was rewarded with this beauty of a dusk photo.

Thanks for joining me on the trip. I plan to keep learning about conservation and have more adventures. I hope you can join me at www.HowToConserve.com. Farewell, for now.

And don’t forget to join me at a few local bookstores in the Bay Area in early November when I will be talking about the book, my trip and all the new conservation news you can handle. Chow! Ciao?

My great grandfather travelled west in a covered wagon from St. Louis to Southern California following the Great Depression. I too am making my way west to return home and end this three month adventure. But it is so strange that within the span of his lifetime, my GGF travelled in covered wagons, then trains, and then cars. He even lived to see a man walk on the moon. Covered wagons to the moon! I’m still in awe of how fast progress moves nowadays.

Before I start hauling a$$ back from the Outer Banks of North Carolina, I stopped to breathe in this amazing sunset!

Then I camped in the Great Smoky Mountains of Tennessee, hiked a mountain and took my breaky with some winged guests.

I travelled to Hope, Arkansas in search of my ancestors who supposedly built much of the town. Upon visiting the town train station, I discovered that the old Alice theatre was built by my family. But like the man said, you can never go home - it is now a bank parking lot.

Along the way, I made some new friends (Mary, Boaz and his female companion) who showed me southern hospitality is not a myth.

Mary helped me locate Josephine, the last of my family to live in Hope. We chewed the fat on Joe’s deck until the sun set.

And now I’m in Texas making my way home. Everything is bigger in Texas!

Hope y’all enjoyed your Labor Day weekend. I spent mine ‘working’ in Virginia Beach (no honking!) and the windy Outer Banks of North Carolina where they just got their first pick-up recycling program. It reminded me that recycling is an evolutionary process for every community. Coming from San Francisco, California, I took it for granted that everyone was doing curbside recycling. In Granby, Colorado, a sparsely-populated mountain area west of Denver, this did not exist. They were more concerned with having a drop-off facility that didn’t take 30 minutes to get to by car. But in Seattle, Washington you actually get fined if you toss too much garbage or too much recycling!

In the Outer Banks, I stayed in Rodanthe a couple nights and was allowed the opportunity to follow around Ryan and some of the other Real Kiteboarding instructors as they worshipped in their house of wind. They live pretty simple lives here. They work to live but when work is your play, the lines get blurred. That’s when you start dreaming of 20 knots south west. Sick.

There was a Leave It To Beaver episode where Eddie Haskell asserts that he has a girlfriend but no one can meet her cuz she lives in Niagara Falls. So I went there to see what the attraction was, albeit 50 years late. She wasn’t there but in her stead I found a force of nature so beautiful, enchanting and powerful that I quickly forgot my sorrow.

I spent an entire day sitting in different spots along the Niagara waters, inching my way towards the great falls. At first I heard gurgling whispers, but soon the waters turned into a complex symphony and finally a deafening roar. These are the sounds of the Great Lakes as they gravitate towards the sea. I recorded an audio podcast of this water’s journey to the frothing mouth of Niagara Falls. Download it to your Ipod - it makes great ambient music for bedtime, baths and other meditations. (44 min)

 

 Standard Podcast [43:00m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download