Welcome to the IDT Energy Blog

We all have the same thought at some point — Eco-friendly is nice, but can we REALLY live in a truly energy saving, eco-friendly, recyclable home?

 CNN has this video on a woman in Oregon who built her own home:

http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/offbeat/2007/07/17/sharify.tiny.house.affl

Now, you should feel the need to question — great, so what?

Answer:  If she can do it for 85 square feet you can for even bigger.

Solar Electricity — It really works:   Try it for yourself. 

Plan and buy here:

http://www.idtenergystore.com/Outdoor-Solar-Panels/c52/index.html

Energy saving lighting, buy here:

http://www.idtenergystore.com/Light-Bulbs/c50/index.html

Rolling Stone magazine will do their green issue on June 28th, but there may a disparity
between content and form.

According to the New York Times:

“Rolling Stone will be printed on what it calls ‘carbon neutral paper,’ because it is made through a process that the magazine claims adds no carbon dioxide to the atmosphere… What neither an editor’s note in Rolling Stone nor a press release sent by the magazine mentions, however, is that the new paper has no recycled content.”

Why not?
“Eric Bates, deputy managing editor of Rolling Stone, said, ‘We think recycled paper is great.’ But, he added, ‘we’re publishing some of the world’s greatest photographers and artists,’ and the print quality on recycled paper does not do them justice. ‘What we’re trying to do is what we can do. We can’t put out the magazine we put out on recycled paper.’ “

Then of course there are quotes from authorities saying there is no difference in quality if one prints on recycled paper. I think that is in the eye of the beholder. Carbon neutral paper works for me.

Thanks to Gizmodo for the latest on Sony’s eco-friendly odo line, which includes:

Spin N’ Snap camera
Push POWER Play viewer
Crank N’ Capture video cams
Pull N’ Play headphones
Solar array Juice Boxes (equivalent of batteries)

How do they work?

“The Spin N’ Snap is probably the most intuitive—you twirl it around your fingers (well, you turn the hole, so hopefully you can twirl it, otherwise it might be tedious) to charge it and then use the same holes as the viewfinder. The others work similarly: You turn the crank on the video camera, tug the cords on the headphones and roll the viewer along a table to charge it up.”

Reminds me of children’s toys – not in a bad way, of course.

According to the AP:

“European light-bulb makers said Tuesday they want to phase out the standard incandescent light bulb in eight years, replacing it with more eco-friendly, energy-efficient lamps.

The switch could lead to significant reductions in carbon dioxide emissions from domestic lighting, and savings of $9.4 billion for European consumers, said the European manufacturers. The group includes General Electric Co., Havells Sylvania, and Philips.”

It’s interesting that the proposal comes from industry insiders and not as a concerted governmental effort. The article mentions that the proposal has huge environmental gains for everyone, and results in financial savings for consumers, but fails to mention what business benefits the manufacturers enjoy. These are businesses, after all…

How cool is this? A tree house which uses the trees themselves as an integral part of the structure (full story here):

“It’s not really built, it’s grown over five years, with its supporting trees trained to grow in the right direction with scaffolding holding it in place. Its creators, architects Mitchell Joachim and Javier Arbona, teamed up with environmental engineer Lara Greden to figure out how to grow vines, roots and trees to create a framework for a house that’s perfectly normal inside.
After the shell of the house is grown in the right shape, the walls are filled in with mud and plaster, and then the insides of the house are constructed using conventional building materials. The only sticking point so far is the windows, and the designers are now experimenting with transparent plastic materials made of soy they hope will expand as the house’s supporting trees grow.”

You can really get a sense of the project when you watch the video.

Some of the dialogue is about as interesting as hearing about how ethanol is made, but the display of green cars is neat. You can see of the sleeker models that you may not spot on the road.

Despite the recent press downplaying the positives of hybrids, this trend is on the up and up.

Benjamin Maresca saw a Hummer H1 advertising Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream shops, and felt that did not jive with the company’s stated environmental goals. He shot off an email to the company – turns out the Hummer was using biodiesel, a perfectly respectable choice, environmentally.

But check out the reaction of the owner of the ice cream store who had sent the Hummer on its mission and the email that he sent to the Ben & Jerry’s rep and Marcesca:

“Instead, Yunis seemed to break the basic rules of ‘netiquette’ by copying Maresca on an e-mail to Perkins in which he called him an ‘imbecile,’ ‘hypocrite,’ ‘intellectually challenged’ and a ‘nincompoop.’

He then characterized Maresca as one of those people that “would ‘Rock the Vote’ for a Hillary/Obama ticket, and frankly we just don’t care anymore…

Speaking of the e-mail he said: ‘I really have no comment on them. The guy (Maresca) is an idiot.’

Yunis later added, ‘The person is a complete moron, and that’s as simple as I can make it for you.’ “

Click here for more delicious details on the incident.

The New York Times Magazine has slew of articles covering all aspects of green design:

Why Are They Greener Than We Are?
By NICOLAI OUROUSSOFF
When it comes to designing buildings that are good for the environment, Europe gets it.

The Accidental Environmentalist
By MICHAEL KIMMELMAN
Whether with paper, old containers, glass or steel, Shigeru Ban makes buildings that waste nothing. Just don’t call him green.

An Eco-House for the Future
Diller Scofidio + Renfro show how sustainability can have style.

The Zero-Energy Solution
By MARK SVENVOLD
How a system installed in your own backyard may one day power your house and your car.

Al Gore Has Big Plans
By JAMES TRAUB
Another book, another slide show, another global rock concert — another run?

This Old, Organic House
By ADAM GOODHEART
Americans have been experimenting with green architecture since the very beginning.

The Worm Turns
By ROB WALKER
How one company strives to turn invertebrate excrement into a hip brand.

Hollywood and Green
By EDWARD LEWINE
Ed Begley Jr., the star of the HGTV reality show ‘‘Living With Ed,’’ tries to make his two-bedroom house in Los Angeles as environmentally sound as possible.

All joking aside, according to this TreeHugger article, the environmental damage of working from home may outweight the benefits (full story here).

EcoGeek comments on the New York Times piece about yellow cabs going green:
“Holy Moly. I guess these are the kinds of things you have to do quickly if you want your city to produce 30% less carbon in a mere 30 years. Bloomberg’s plan will see a 20% increase in hybrid taxis every year for the next five years.
The current standard taxi, the Crown Victoria, gets about 14 mpg in the city. It’ll be replaced by a wide variety of new taxis, from the smaller Prius, to the Ford Escape hybrid SUV. 13,000 Taxis is a lot to replace, but apparently a 20% per year churn is about what taxi companies deal with in New York, so, basically, every new cab they buy will have to be a hybrid.”
Will cab fare prices go up as a result?
Will people use more public transportation or walk as a result?
What do you think?