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What is your realistic idea? The tentacles of building homes is what’s going to get this country going again. Do you get it that the homes are already being knocked down? Do you know that Chinese investors surveyed McMansionville areas (California?) & gawk @ these ridiculous places.
TOTALLY GREEN is smart & requires new, job creating, ways to design/build things & it minimizes moral hazard by it being the right thing to do for humanity’s well being.
Well with nearly 20 million empty homes in this country the last thing we need is more and the next to last thing is that it isn't "green" to tear down a brand new home of which tons of energy went into, to build another brand new home on the spot which consumes more energy. If there is no market for that brand new empty home, there sure as hell wont be any market for another home on the same spot.
Yes that's right I'm being realistic.
Yes I know all about half finishing housing developments, I travel around the USA for business.
I never said on the same spot, but I was vague. When I said Cap & Trade principle I meant: BULLDOZE the non-conducive homes/communities in one area & build TOTALLY GREEN homes in another area that’s better suited to living/working.
Also, I’m trying to look beyond the waste factor & move on. The future heating, cooling & transportation costs are going to be more expensive, which translates into those 20 million homes being even less desirable/conducive as time goes on. Those homes are an impediment to the future!
It’s unrealistic for this Country to wait until fossil fuels become astronomically expensive before we dramatically change our energy/lifestyle policy.
One more thing wanneroo: I completely agree with your #32 post! The people just need to give the Gov’t the green light!
It’s unrealistic for this Country to wait until fossil fuels become astronomically expensive before we dramatically change our energy/lifestyle policy.
Counterpoint: it's unrealistic for the country to dramatically change its energy policy and lifestyle UNTIL fossil fuels become prohibitively expensive. For better or worse, that I think is more reality-based.
But I mean, I spend $50-$60/month on gasoline -- my primary commuting vehicle gets 65-70 MPG and my beast of burden gets 24 MPG. I spend on average $55/month on electricity (have electric heating and cooling) here in Texas and about $22/month on water. It's not as if fossil fuel costs are strangling me. So here's the question: I live, all by my lonesome, in a somewhat traditional, brand new house. 1700 sq ft, two car attached, three bedrooms, huge central living room/dining nook/kitchen area. No chimney, and lots and lots of Icynene foam insulation in the attic and walls. 14 SEER undersized heat pump.
So would this house be one you'd want to knock down in favor of a "totally green" house? Are you talking about an 820 sq ft haybale construction house with no artificial materials, mandatory composting toilet, and only natural light? Or is this one with the excellent foam insulation good enough? Just curious here.
Three more points and then I'll shut up:
1. I really wanted to build a monolithic dome house. I seriously looked into it, loved the layouts and efficiency, but found the cost was prohibitive and there's virtually nowhere anywhere near anything where I would be able to build one. Extending the commute from 7 miles to 40 miles would more than kill the increased efficiency.
2. After building my house, I really wanted to do maintenance free Xeriscaping. Indigenous plants, ground cover, pebbles, stones, etc. HOA said 'no way in hell.' It's okay though because I rarely water my bermuda grass.
3. One change I would love to see is a massive move toward telecommuting. We need the fiber networks, the PC technology for high def teleconferencing, monitoring, and workflow sharing, the legal easing of many industry regulations, and a change in the social stigma that I've observed about telecommuting (i.e., some of my coworkers are dead set against it).
Counterpoint: it's unrealistic for the country to dramatically change its energy policy and lifestyle UNTIL fossil fuels become prohibitively expensive. For better or worse, that I think is more reality-based.
This is why The People have trouble governing their Countries. If we can’t get it right ourselves (Jimmy Carter tried) then the Gov’t will have to do a butcher job for us. I do agree with your quote however; hopefully this crisis is worse than advertised—‘A crisis is a terrible thing to waste!’
Quote:
But I mean, I spend $50-$60/month on gasoline -- my primary commuting vehicle gets 65-70 MPG and my beast of burden gets 24 MPG. I spend on average $55/month on electricity (have electric heating and cooling) here in Texas and about $22/month on water. It's not as if fossil fuel costs are strangling me. So here's the question: I live, all by my lonesome, in a somewhat traditional, brand new house. 1700 sq ft, two car attached, three bedrooms, huge central living room/dining nook/kitchen area. No chimney, and lots and lots of Icynene foam insulation in the attic and walls. 14 SEER undersized heat pump..
This is not about saving money; that comes later. If we put the cost of the ‘oil wars’ into the cost of fossil fuels you might feel that noose tightening around your neck?
No need to knock your house down since your living in it; by the way it sounds like a comfortable, medium footprint to me. I’m talking vacant McMansion strips that distract the country from entering the realities’ of the 21st Century.
I never said on the same spot, but I was vague. When I said Cap & Trade principle I meant: BULLDOZE the non-conducive homes/communities in one area & build TOTALLY GREEN homes in another area that’s better suited to living/working.
Also, I’m trying to look beyond the waste factor & move on. The future heating, cooling & transportation costs are going to be more expensive, which translates into those 20 million homes being even less desirable/conducive as time goes on. Those homes are an impediment to the future!
It’s unrealistic for this Country to wait until fossil fuels become astronomically expensive before we dramatically change our energy/lifestyle policy.
One more thing wanneroo: I completely agree with your #32 post! The people just need to give the Gov’t the green light!
There is nothing TOTALLY GREEN from what I have seen or at least nothing that will be accepted as such by the greenies.
Build the home on the spot of the old one bulldozed or built elsewhere it's still a huge waste of resources.
And actually it's no ones business. The market decides and it's up to people to build what they want when they want it. Right now the market is inflated and we are broke and don't have money for such foolishness. And by we, I mean the consumer.
You don't need a weatherman to tell you which way the wind blows and you won't need a financial genius to clue you in on this latest economic disaster. Predictions are out there to entice the proles to seek some sage advice on the security of their last precious dollars. It's always humorous to see the level of understanding displayed by those who think that the economy will react in the manner of a machine, you press some buttons and presto, you have the desired results. The limited amount of real science in all things economic would seem to be obviated by the fact that so far no one has been able to define the terms of the "recovery", at what past level of economic activity will we recover to? Back to Million dollar 1200 square foot ramblers, pickup trucks costing thirty five to forty thousand bucks? I guess we'll have that distinction wherein every home is backed by government dollars, every job is the result of government spending and we'll still insist on calling that setup a product of our precious "free market".
First we had Bush and company led by that Wall Street golden boy Hank Paulson telling us that we could just print up some dough in the back room and all will be fine, next we see the big O and another gang from America's wealth Mecca adjusting the waist in the pants of toxic debt worldwide, just a stitch here and there and now we just expanded the problem but every thing is OK. You'd have to be a real chump to think that we can buy our way out of this with dollars that should be going to support the nations interests not those of Wall Street. Keep on BS'ing the people and shoveling our collective wealth down to those who paid your way into the seat of power, that's the mantra of politicians, doesn't matter which party is sitting in the White House, they both belong to Daddy.
The US economy is a fourteen trillion dollar a year behemoth that can take a lot of punching, it can be down on the mat one day and up on it's feet the next, but overall it's just like a punched out fighter who can't go the distance because the legs just aint up to it. We will have to see the flat out demise of our trumped up way of life before we'll ever admit to the folly that produced so many free market advocates, capitalism isn't about free enterprise, or free anything for that matter, it's about CAPITAL, "moolah," "bread," "dough," whatever you want to call it it's always about the money and money just doesn't care about people. Markets are just that, a place to trade, a place to steal, a place to cheat, to say that the market is "free" is simply a concocted notion for the lower classes to latch on to and thus feel that whatever transpires there is at the very least tied to "our freedoms",blah, blah, blah, it couldn't be more obvious that our market economy was simply a charade in which the rich got richer and the rest of us got useless paper.............
You don't need a weatherman to tell you which way the wind blows and you won't need a financial genius to clue you in on this latest economic disaster. Predictions are out there to entice the proles to seek some sage advice on the security of their last precious dollars. It's always humorous to see the level of understanding displayed by those who think that the economy will react in the manner of a machine, you press some buttons and presto, you have the desired results. The limited amount of real science in all things economic would seem to be obviated by the fact that so far no one has been able to define the terms of the "recovery", at what past level of economic activity will we recover to? Back to Million dollar 1200 square foot ramblers, pickup trucks costing thirty five to forty thousand bucks? I guess we'll have that distinction wherein every home is backed by government dollars, every job is the result of government spending and we'll still insist on calling that setup a product of our precious "free market".
First we had Bush and company led by that Wall Street golden boy Hank Paulson telling us that we could just print up some dough in the back room and all will be fine, next we see the big O and another gang from America's wealth Mecca adjusting the waist in the pants of toxic debt worldwide, just a stitch here and there and now we just expanded the problem but every thing is OK. You'd have to be a real chump to think that we can buy our way out of this with dollars that should be going to support the nations interests not those of Wall Street. Keep on BS'ing the people and shoveling our collective wealth down to those who paid your way into the seat of power, that's the mantra of politicians, doesn't matter which party is sitting in the White House, they both belong to Daddy.
The US economy is a fourteen trillion dollar a year behemoth that can take a lot of punching, it can be down on the mat one day and up on it's feet the next, but overall it's just like a punched out fighter who can't go the distance because the legs just aint up to it. We will have to see the flat out demise of our trumped up way of life before we'll ever admit to the folly that produced so many free market advocates, capitalism isn't about free enterprise, or free anything for that matter, it's about CAPITAL, "moolah," "bread," "dough," whatever you want to call it it's always about the money and money just doesn't care about people. Markets are just that, a place to trade, a place to steal, a place to cheat, to say that the market is "free" is simply a concocted notion for the lower classes to latch on to and thus feel that whatever transpires there is at the very least tied to "our freedoms",blah, blah, blah, it couldn't be more obvious that our market economy was simply a charade in which the rich got richer and the rest of us got useless paper.............
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Do you know that Chinese investors surveyed McMansionville areas (California?) & gawk @ these ridiculous places.
I’m talking vacant McMansion strips that distract the country from entering the realities’ of the 21st Century.
