As someone who works in public relations for a permaculture guild, I often hear from people wanting to know what permaculture is all about. In a nutshell, permaculture is a set of design principles aimed at addressing human needs sustainably. Sustainable means ecologically, economically, and socially. We can divide human needs into five broad categories: food, water, shelter, energy, and community.
Windows, even double and triple pane are still one of the weakest parts of a building envelope. A typical wall may be R13 while a good double pane window is only R-4. Adding good insulation to your windows can greatly improve your over all insulation.
These instructions are for DIY insulating roman shades.
Happy Holidays 2010
This year we have held true to our principals of 2009 and exchanged just a few second hand gifts of things that were needed plus a few new toys for our son from the grandparents. I ended up needing a few new things myself while we were traveling by train in the week leading up to our holiday so I put the empty packages under the tree so I could remember to be thankful for receiving the things I needed when I needed them.
The Prologue: I have long been reluctant to add a clothesline to our basement.
We blogged about molten-salt plants a few months ago here on greenknowe.org, and now we have some good news to go along with that. California has approved a molten-salt solar plant, and construction is expected to begin sometime late in 2011. Hopefully the cost and efficiency will play out as expected, and more of these plants will be built in the future.
What to do with the accursed Tetra Pak?
By this point in the project we were running about a month behind schedule and with bad weather just around the corner, we couldnt afford any delays. Just before our insulation was scheduled to go in, disaster struck. Our local insulator's equipment broke down, it wasn't going to be repaired in time, and there were no other local providers for AirKrete. What could we
Our home renovation project also included replacing the old flat tar and gravel roof with a new, sloped metal roof. A sloped roof is of course much better for mounting the solar panels, and we selected a single-plane south-facing roof that faces south so that we would get good panel-placement options. We selected a metal roof because this style is best for recl
Since we already needed to open up all of the walls in the house and take off the roof as well, this was also the perfect time to revisit the electrical system. The house, being sixty-plus years old, still had a lot of knob-and-tube wiring, and only 60 amps of service. Since we have been planning for some time to get an electric car (when available), that just wouldn't cut it. Additionally, we wanted to put in enough solar panels to run the car, and that also demanded revisions to the house's electrical.
Its now well into September and the north and south walls have been re-framed. So far we have done exceedingly well using almost entirely reclaimed lumber (once more I would like to extend our gratitude to the ReUsable Lumber Company.)