Posts by Keith Collins

13 Mar

Announcing BrightBuilt 2: Deep Energy Retrofit

At the New England Sustainable Energy Association (NESEA) conference in Boston this week, the BrightBuilt team gave an update on the Barn project – past, present, and future.

And it’s the future I want to talk about here. On Wednesday, we announced the start of the next BrightBuilt sustainable building project: BrightBuilt 2: Deep Energy Retrofit. In collaboration with NESEA and with the US Green Building Council of Maine, the BrightBuilt team is initiating a new open source collaboration, this time aimed at developing solutions for decreasing the carbon footprint of the 135 million existing dwellings in the US.

We chose a retrofit for our second project because:

1. Designing reproducible solutions for green remodeling projects is inherently more difficult than doing the same for new construction, because of the extreme diversity of the existing housing stock, and the uniqueness of each particular building’s materials, construction, systems, and history.

2. Each year, we build perhaps 1 million new homes in the US on average, compared to the 135 million existing homes. Even if we build each new home to NetZero standards, so that they have a carbon footprint of zero (which is highly unlikely in the near term, at least), these supergreen new homes will lower the average carbon footprint of our total housing stock by less than 1% per year, and will do nothing to lower the absolute amount of carbon being emitted by the existing homes.

3. A large percentage of existing homes are highly energy-inefficient: poorly insulated, not weathertight, with antiquated systems and appliances.

So,it’s clear that the greatest challenge, as well as the greatest opportunity, for decreasing the carbon footprint of housing in the US, is to find practical, affordable methods for increasing the energy efficiency of existing homes.

The BB2: Deep Energy Retrofit project will be run in several phases. First, we are looking for a building in need of renovation. It needs to be owned by a nonprofit organization (because we will be soliciting donations of time, materials, and money for the project). The nonprofit organization needs to be willing to take responsibility for the bulk of the funding of their renovation, and willing to work with the BrightBuilt team over an extended period to accomplish the goals for the project. We are soliciting nominations for appropriate buildings now, so if you know of a worthy NPO that’s thinking about a green renovation of its building, send us the details in an email to info@brightbuiltbarn.com.

The process of selecting the building from among the nominees will be open and transparent, and all interested parties will be able to give input via links from the BBB website.

Once the building is selected, the NPO will receive discounted services, discounted materials, and at least $10,000 cash towards the cost of the renovation.

The design for the deep energy retrofit will be developed in an open source way, with anyone able to contribute their ideas. We are looking to build a community of green professionals and enthusiasts, in order to advance the state of the art of green retrofits, and make them more affordable, accessible, beautiful, and reproducible.

Once the design is set, we will keep you updated on the process of construction, so we all can see how the designs translate into reality. All designs, specifications, and lessons learned will be available free on the web for anyone to use.

And finally, we plan to monitor the performance of the building for at least a year after the retrofit is complete, again to see how reality matches up with theory.

Please join us as we launch this exciting and important endeavor. A link on the front page of our website will take you to a fuller description of the BB2: Deep Energy Retrofit project, with information on how you can get involved.

I hope to hear from you soon!

Keith Collins

10 Jun

Another LEED Platinum from KTA

Kaplan Thompson Architects, the team that designed BrightBuilt Barn, have recently been notified that their Metro Green project in Arlington, Virginia has been awarded LEED Platinum, the first LEED Platinum home in the state of Virginia.

Sited only 5 miles from the center of Washington DC, the structure has a whole wish list of green features, including a green roof and rainwater capture, in addition to solar electric energy and super-low heating costs.

Here’s a brief article about this home, and the website of the builder.

For only $1.175 million, this green dream home can be yours.

Keith Collins

18 May

Measuring Performance

Updated energy figures as of 5:00 PM today, May 18:
Total electricity produced from go-live in October 2008:   3135 kwh
Total electricity consumed by the Barn in the same period: 1001 kwh
Total surplus to date: 2134 kwh
My electric bill at the main house for April: $7.95
Soon we will have the new and improved website implemented, which will have all performance numbers continuously updated. Stay tuned.

Keith Collins

29 Apr

More Numbers

It’s been a sunny week here in Maine, and so the Barn has been creating lots of electricity. I decided to check all the numbers again, and compare them to those at the last post, on April 20.

Today at noon the Barn’s total production since go-live was 2745 kilowatt-hours. That means that in the past 9 days the PV panels have pumped out 224 kwh, or an average of almost 25 kwh each day. Usage has been modest, now that the cold weather is gone, with air handling, lights, and computers accounting for most of the load – and with the longer days, light usage is going down noticeably. Total usage to date has been 970 kwh, compared with 953 kwh ten days ago, or only 1.9 kwh of electricity used per day.

This means that the current difference between electricity generated and electricity used in the Barn stands at 1775 kwh surplus, meaning that we have put a net of 1775 kwh out on the grid over the past 6 months. The past 9 days alone have accounted for 207 kwh surplus, or about 23 kwh per day on average.

This contribution to the grid helps pay off our carbon debt incurred in the making of the Barn, at the rate of one to two pounds of carbon per kilowatt-hour, depending on the major source of the electricity on the grid. So we appear to have knocked approximately one metric ton of carbon off our debt, even through the depths a cold Maine winter.

And since our main house is just “upstream” of the Barn, we get the benefit of most of that surplus electricity, which is lowering our electrical bill substantially. Last month, our bill from Central Maine Power was only $11.00.

Here’s hoping for a sunny Spring!

Keith Collins

20 Apr

Performance So Far

Spring is, well, springing up here in Maine. At 9:00 this morning it’s bright and sunny, and the outside temperature is 50 degrees Fahrenheit. Almost all of the snow has melted, except for one small mound perhaps 6 feet long and 2 feet wide that lies in the perpetual shadow of the north side of the main house.

In the Barn it is a cozy 68 degrees, with no heating except the sunshine pouring in the south-facing windows.

It is almost 6 months since the Barn systems were turned on last October, and it seems time to assess performance so far.

Most important to me, the Barn has been a pleasure to live and work in. It has been comfortably warm all winter, even during record-setting cold spells. The systems have worked flawlessly, with no breakdowns or failures. The structure has held up to extreme weather, including impressive snowfalls of up to 2 feet per storm, and several feet cumulatively.

As of this morning at 9:00 AM, the solar electric panels have produced 2521 kilowatt-hours of electricity since being “switched on” last October. The barn itself has consumed 953 kwh during that time, for a net surplus of 1568 kilowatt-hours. I find this remarkable, given how cold this winter was.

Those surplus 1568 kwh translate into nearly 3000 pounds (more than a metric ton) of carbon that will not be needed from a coal-fired electric generating plant.

More directly, the Barn’s energy surplus is reducing our use of grid power at the main house -my electric bill this past month was $11.00, compared to nearly $130 this same time last year.

Soon we plan to have the Barn’s energy performance tracked continuously on our website, so anyone can monitor our results.

So stay tuned – there’s much more to come.

Keith Collins

10 Apr

More Hugs from Treehugger – BBB is Best of 2008

Treehugger, one of the leading green lifestyle blogs, has just awarded BrightBuilt Barn its annual “Best of Green” designation in the Architecture and Design category.

Here’s the link:

http://www.treehugger.com/galleries/2009/04/best-of-green-design-and-architecture.php?page=11

Keith Collins

6 Apr

BrightBuilt Barn is Awarded LEED Platinum

BrightBuilt Barn has recently received official notification that it has been awarded LEED Platinum status, the highest level of sustainability certification by the US Green Building Council. BBB thus becomes only the 7th home in all of New England to attain this highest level of certification, which is awarded to fewer than 10% of all projects that apply.

Keith Collins

6 Apr

BrightBuilt Barn Goes International

On Wednesday, April 1, BrightBuilt Barn was featured on a segment of “This Week in the Americas”, a weekly newscast of France24, who describe themselves as the CNN of France.

Check out the link below – the clip on BBB is toward the end of the show:

http://www.france24.com/en/20090402-week-americas-obama-car-industry-mexico-washington-against-drug-trafficking-el-salvador-oscar-romero

Keith Collins

30 Dec

More Great Press

BrightBuilt Barn had a banner day, being favorably mentioned on two premiere eco-blogs on the same day.

First, a follow-up post by Preston Koerner of Jetson Green blog, who first reviewed us back in September:

http://www.jetsongreen.com/2008/12/brightbuilt-bar.html

Second, an extremely favorable mention in Treehugger – headlined “BrightBuilt Barn is Built, Bright, and Beautiful”:

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2008/12/bright-built-barn-built.php

And we are expecting more to come….

Keith Collins

29 Dec

LEED Platinum Buildings Go Mainstream

Preston Koerner at the Jetson Green blog has compiled a compendium of 33 buildings who have achieved, or are in the process of receiving, Platinum ratings from the US Green Building Council’s Leadersip in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) initiative.

The link is here:
http://www.jetsongreen.com/2008/12/leed-platinum-p.html
BrightBuilt Barn is referenced in the article. Now that construction is complete, we are in the process of applying for a LEED Platinum rating – we will keep you posted on our progress through the rigorous certification process.

More on LEED can be found here:
http://www.usgbc.org/DisplayPage.aspx?CategoryID=19

Keith Collins

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