Our Green Technologies – Week 8
My wife Lynne and I have done a lot of research into green technologies the directly affect our lives and of course the pocket book. We started very simply by changing out our light bulbs around the house with fluorescent bulbs. The cost is very much close to the same as incandescent bulbs so as they burnt out we replaced them with the new technology. I have not done the math to determine the cost effectiveness yet but it is probably worth the effort. Take out a 60 watt bulb and replace it with a 12 watt bulb times thirty bulbs….you get the picture. So without changing our lifestyle at all, we save money and use much less electricity.
As I was getting ready to retire we started looking for property and/or out retirement home. So we started investigating the green technologies for ways to better our investments in the long term. We are in the process of purchasing a log home that is better insulated than 90% of homes in America and has geothermal assisted heating and cooling. So we lower the cost to heat and cool and we have a lower carbon footprint. Now we haven’t even moved in yet but we are way ahead of the game. The home is all electric so we plan on installing an alternate heat source of an LP Fireplace. We also intend on looking into solar power at least to augment what we have coming in over the electricitygrid. The home is situated in the trees, but we do have areas that the sun gets through. We would like to utilize wind power also, but so far only one type of turbine may fit the bill. This is a vertical “squirrel cage” type fan mounted on a pole from Mariah Power. It sort of looks like a skiny tree. As a matter of fact you could line your driveway with them….I mean I wouldn’t but you could.
In any case I believe Lynne and I found our niche in Green Technologies. It will allow us to further delve into better ways to live that will help the environment or at least lesson our carbon footprint. So as we find things out we will document them, put our personal touch on how we will use them and how we like them. STAY TUNED!
Jay
Neat stuff, Will definitely come back again soon=D