TRULY GREEN HOMES

"Greenwashing refers to putting a gloss of eco-friendly ideas on existing non-eco-friendly things," said Eric Doub, speaking to the Boulder Rotary Club this month. He didn't say so, but it sounds like adding vitamins to junk food. Or maybe like putting lipstick on a pig.

Doub grew up in Boulder and in 1994 founded Ecofutures Building, a home-building company. He described his "whole systems" approach to home construction, emphasizing the goal of producing a house that would be net energy zero. The home would produce from non-carbon sources at least as much energy as needed to operate the house. His firm has built several houses in the Boulder area, including his own, and he is currently building in Fraser, which he calls "the icebox of the United States," and Longmont.

"A net zero home will have a construction cost of 5 percent to 10 percent more than a current conventional house," said Doub. "But because of the savings arising from not having to buy energy from utility companies, the home will save much more than that additional initial cost over the years."

Currently Xcel allows homes that have solar panels to put excess electricity onto the power grid, paying the owner for each kilowatt-hour provided and resulting in a negative electric bill. Doub said he receives checks regularly from Xcel for this reason.

"Comfort, health and durability are the watchwords for our home building," said Doub. "We want to build a home that will be in use for a hundred years."

That means both high-quality materials and careful attention to design and construction.

"The two keys to net zero construction are to reduce the demand of the structure for energy and to provide what energy is needed from renewable sources," he said.

Currently that means careful attention to avoiding energy loss to the environment, through wall insulation and triple-pane windows, and use of solar panels to provide energy by using the greenest of sources, solar radiation. Use of solar thermal storage seems a new possibility for the near future.

Habitat for Humanity built a net zero home in 2005 with a construction premium of 8 percent above conventional. Doub's own home has a premium of 7 percent.

"To make net zero construction mainstream and scalable, we pay attention to using as many conventional materials and construction techniques as we can," Doub said.

Consequently net zero homes may call for additional insulation, and building techniques, while conventional, may call for exceptional attention to detail. A net zero home won't have a furnace, which might give the homeowner pause.

Can existing homes be retrofitted for net zero? Doub thinks there might be ways to renovate but obvious problems since the whole-system construct can't be applied.

For more information on Rotary, see www.boulderrotary.org or www.rotary.org.

BOULDER ROTARY CLUB
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Contact: Sue Deans, 303-579-9580