Going Green?

Amory Lovins coined expression Negawatt power, where you invest to reduce your electrical demand.We're big negawatt fans

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negawatt_power

How big? 24 Panel PV system on roof w battery backup, hot water heaters "on demand" CF light bulbs. Watt's a unit of energy, NOT light.

Watt's that you say? 12 watt CF won't give you enough light? It really does. Light's measured in Lumens http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lumen_(unit)

Watt is energy

Lumen is light

Fiat Lux

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Let_there_be_light

Berkeley... someone wrote something nice about the city!

David L. Kirp wrote an interesting Open Forum article, Semper fi, Berkeley, in today's San Francisco Chronicle.

In it, he talks about Berkeley programs such as the one which encourages solar electric (photovoltaic cell) by having the city provide the upfront costs and get paid over a 20 year property tax assessment.

Our 24 panel PV System... with battery backup
We're proud to have been part of the solution for years

Berkeley has an active community preparedness program. I've taken several classes and highly recommend them.

Being Berkeley, there will be lots of comments upon the article - both pro and con - but I recommend reading it for yourself!

Ira