The Bloom Box: a power plant for the home

This should give the BIG ENERGY execs some pause.

Watch CBS News Videos Online

Green Building Materials Guide on Green Planet

When it comes to building or renovating a home, there are few simple choices. From styles and colors to location and design, there's an awful lot to consider, but, thankfully, you don't have to settle for materials whose production or use has a big-time negative impact on the planet. Here to help is our Green Materials Guide, which will help guide you through the process of finding green materials for every green project in your home.

Green Materials Guide : Planet Green

Michelle Kaufmann's Smart Home

Pretty cool to see it go up like this.

STAR Community Index : A Framework for Green Communities

The STAR Community Index is a new tool designed to help local governments plan, track and measure their sustainability programs. Inspired by the U.S. Green Building Council’s (USGBC) LEED ® Green Building Rating System ™.

STAR Community Index - ICLEI Local Governments for Sustainability USA

Green Home Renovation

More "greening" videos here.

Green Home Guide

Green Home Guide: Here's a website that has reviews and advice on Green products and services, from professionals and homeowners.

Wozniak's New Goal is Efficient Housing

Interesting interview with Apple co-founder and legendary hacker Steve Wozniak where he talks about building an energy efficient home using Southern Yellow Pine which has a natural property of heating and cooling homes, eliminating the need for A/C and heating. He also takes about a company called Enertia that has kit houses made of Southern Yellow Pine, ready to assemble without using any nails. This is a really intriguing idea!

You build a home out of a type of wood that keeps the temperature constant without air conditioning or heaters. The miracle wood in this category is Southern Yellow Pine. As for renewable resources, more Southern Yellow Pine trees are planted each year than are used. I'm told this is the only tree with this benefit. The Southern Yellow Pine has a resin inside that melts and freezes at 71 degrees F., a very comfortable temperature for humans. The chemical actions of melting and freezing work to balance the temperature. If it's a hot day, some small amount of the resin melts (it takes a huge amount of energy to melt a tiny amount) and the melting process pulls heat from the surroundings, from the home. When it gets colder at night, the resin-wood emits heat as it freezes.

In high school chemistry we had the latent heat of fusion concept. You let ice settle in water. You can measure the temperatures. The ice and water are both 32 degrees F. It seems like the tiniest amount of energy would cause the ice to melt. After all, you only have to change it maybe a hundredth or less of a degree. But it takes a huge amount of energy to accomplish melting. This represents the difference in energy between the solid and liquid states. In this way, large amounts of energy can be stored. In the case of Southern Yellow Pine, energy from the summer can even be stored in the wood until a later season in some cases.

This company Enertia prepares blocks of this Southern Yellow Pine with grooves and sells the pieces as kit homes that you build yourself. The only tool you need is a power drill. No nails are used in the construction. I suspect that's because the metal of nails helps outside temperature conduct to the inside. The homes are also designed in an envelope fashion with 2 layers of wood and a space between them for natural air circulation around the home. The Southern side is all glass to collect sunlight. The homes are designed for more sunlight getting in during the Winter, when the sun is lower in the sky, than during summer, when the sun is higher in the sky.

All of these simple principles wind up with a very attractive house that is as normal and livable as any other, but without insulation or air conditioning or heating. The typical energy bill might be as low as $30 a month, depending on where you live. The outside temperature can be 50 degrees hotter or colder than the inside temperature of 71 degrees.

Recently I bumped into the builder of my first home. We reminisced and I told him of my plans to build one of these Enertia homes. He had built many homes with the efficient ram-dirt process and for one of them he used the resin-wood (presumably Southern Yellow Pine) for the roof. With only the roof being of this resin-wood the temperature inside never varied more than 5 degrees he told me. So the combination of approaches is one thing I'm considering too.

Wozniak's New Goal is Efficient Housing

How to find an eco-realtor

Green seems to be all the rage lately, and web sites are cropping up all over cyberspace to help green homeowners sell their houses.

Lighter Footstep - How to find an eco-realtor

Sharp & CitiMortgage offer home financing for solar energy systems

“We recognize that consumers have become more energy-conscious and are increasingly more receptive to solar power. In some cases they are even willing to pay a premium for a home that uses solar energy,” said Ron Kenedi, vice president of Sharp’s Solar Energy Solutions Group. “In addition to offering reliable and attractive solar solutions, Sharp will now work with CitiMortgage to provide a way for consumers anywhere in the U.S. to finance the purchase of a system, and start them on the road toward enjoying the environmental and financial benefits of solar power.”

Sharp| Press Releases

Building Green Blog

Check-out Kevin Contreras' blog for more information, post questions and concerns with building a straw bale house. This is a very good resource if you are considering building a "green" home.