My Built Environment: Good, Bad, and Really Ugly

Yesterday, I attended a seminar on what Colorado’s new Solar Law is all about, and how it applies to builders. In a nutshell, this law, which goes into effect August 5th 2009, would require builders to offer 3 options to homeowners: 1) An option to provide a conduit system for eventual wiring/plumbing of systems; 2) Actually prewire/plumb for future systems; 3)Install either a PV or Thermal system, or both. These are only options that buyers would have to pay for, and buyers can turn down all of them. Also, this law is not retroactive to existing homes, homes that are under construction. Also, if a builder builds a spec home, does not install any of these options, and the home is sold after it is no longer feasible to install these options, then there is no retrofit required or need to offer the options. The builder may wish too do it anyway, but it isn’t required. In my opinion, the prewire option is only a few hundred bucks, so why not just put it in anyway?

I am all for alternative energy, particularly solar, and hope that the costs keep coming down. However, I can see some unintended consequences (therefore lawsuits) coming down the pike over the next several years. One of which is basic design. Some roofs simply have too many vents, pipes, chimneys, and other clutter to prevent installation of an effective solar system. Right now the state law does not require any modification of design to accomodate solar systems, but I can see that one coming.

And what about shading? If a two story home is built next to a one story home, and then the one story home no longer has adequate exposure to solar, will there be lawsuits here? If you have a lot next to a ranch home, will you have to specifically design your home to preserve solar access for the existing home? The law does not require you too, but will that come?

And finally, there is the matter of landscaping. For decades, people have been encouraged to plant large trees on the south side of their home to provide shading and reduce the AC load. However, trees also reduce the ability of solar systems to perform. So if we quite planting trees on the south side, have the calcs been done to accomodate for the extra AC loading? For that matter, will we now have to carefully consider the placement of trees so as to not block an adjacent properties solar access?

I realize that all of my points are rather oversimplified, but I am trying to make a point. While I am all for solar energy, I also strongly believe in personal property rights, so what kind of slippery slope are we going to wander around on to protect ones persons personal property rights, and anothers rights to solar access?

Out of this seminar, I also did get a lot of good information on solar technologies, costs, rebates, etc., so it was a great conference for me. Well worth the $25.

Recently we took a vacation to Taos and Santa, Fe New Mexico, a place we been many times. I did get a lot of new fodder to wrtie about, but I have been busy getting caught up with work again. I will start writting again soon!

The Star Tribune in Minneapolis recently reported on a historically designated home that has fallen into foreclosure. That is bad enough, but apparently thieves have broken in and pretty much stripped the place of all the cool details that made it historical. This is really sad, and is something that preservation forces should be on watch for happening in other areas. However, this isn’t limited to just historical homes. In many parts of the country, such as Detroit, Las Vegas, and Phoenix, vandels (or the foreclosed owners themselves) are stripping homes of anything of value such as sinks, toilets, light fixtures, cabinets, even furnaces. I remember when I was looking for my first home during that last real estate meltdown in Denver in the late 1980’s, I found some places with the same thing…no cabinets, light fixtures, etc. Pretty sad.

In Suprise, AZ though, they are beginning to prosecute people for this, as reported by Jay Thompson on his blog, The Phoenix Real Estate Guy.

Those of us in design and building industries, and particularly those of us that focus on green building, always like to use more environmentally correct products whenever possible. When I started building 10 years ago, are homes always had large front porches, and they still do. At the time, all of our porches were wood framed, and we used Trex decking in lieu of Redwood as the surface material. Trex is considered a green product since it uses a lot of wood scraps in its making, never needs staining, won’t warp, rot, or splinter. I totally agree with all of this, except for the staining part. We have had a Trex porch for nine years now. I do truly like the product, but after nine years, it was starting to look pretty grungy. There have been wine spills, paint spills, and water stains. I have cleaned it several times, but to no avail. So I finally decided to stain it, using a stain that was approved by Trex. In my case, I used a solid color stain by Behr. I also put down two coats. First, I was amazed at how well Trex took the stain, and second, I was amazed at how the stain covered over all of the spots, including the paint spills. I was hoping for them to not be as noticeable, but they are simply gone now. The porch looks brand new, and now matches the paint scheme of our house. Now we shall see how long the stain lasts. BTW, in case you are keeping track, the Behr stain is water based, does not off gas, and cleanup was with water. That is pretty green in itself.

Welcome to my new and improved blog, or at least eventually improved. To all of my readers who were following me at my old blog location, thank you for making the switch. For those of you who are new to my blog, welcome! Just to let you know, while the content here will stay the same, I am continuing to tweak the format look and feal of this blog, so don’t be surprised if the appearance changes a time or two! For those of you who arn’t familer with WordPress, it can be a very powerful tool. You can  also use it for far more than just a blogging tool. As an example, check out one of my other websites, Midori, which has been entirely formatted and encoded in WordPress.

Once again, welcome, and thanks for following me here!