Green Building | Green Building Goes Subsidized In Hawaii
Posted on April 9, 2012
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Subsidized Housing Goes Super-Green In Hawaii
Hawaii is one of the most expensive places in the United States to buy a home—but a new community on Oahu’s West Shore offers homes that are both affordable and green.
Planned and developed by the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands (DHHL) and Group 70 International, Kaupuni Village was built by Hunt Companies, which calls the development the first net-zero affordable housing project in the nation. The community has received a number of awards, including the highest green building designation, LEED Platinum certification.
While the median price of a home in Oahu is around $600,000, the homes in Kaupuni Village will sell for between $212,000 and $260,000, thanks to subsidies from the federal Native American Housing Assistance Self Determination Act. The community was constructed specifically for residents that make below 80 percent of the area’s median income level.
Homes within the community come in three and four-bedroom models and are design with a myriad of energy-saving features. SolarWorld solar panels generate electricity and provide heat for water. Energy monitoring devices have been installed in each of the homes, monitoring energy efficient lighting and appliances.
All of the features combined allow the homes to produce more energy than they consume, making them net-zero energy homes. The energy efficiency features in the homes also mean a reduction in energy consumption of more than 50 percent when compared to standard-built baseline home
“Hunt is excited to have played a part in such a cutting-edge project,” Bud Waters, Executive Vice President of the Hawaii building division of Hunt Companies said in a statement. “Hunt is committed to building sustainable communities and affordable housing. It was an honor to work with the DHHL staff and their consultants on achieving both with this one community.”
Along with energy-efficient features in each home, residents in the community also have the ability to take part in a variety of activities throughout the community. Abundant gardening space and aquaculture ponds mean residents can grow their own foods and cook together. A pavilion was constructed onsite for community gatherings, hula and other cultural activities.
Kaupuni Village was also the winner of the 2011 USGBC Hawaii Chapter’s Outstanding Green Project Team Award. This award honored Kaupuni Village and the DHHL development and design team for demonstrating a holistic approach towards integrating green building practices and principles into a LEED project as well as the development of innovative solutions to regional design challenges.
Source: Green Building
Green Building
Environmenal Activism: Make Your Own Green Job Today!
Posted on October 6, 2011
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Environmentally Friendly Garden Tools
People can be so funny in our day, they will pay hundreds of dollars for membership to a gym, so that they can keep in good physical shape, but wouldn’t dream of mowing their own grass, especially with an old fashioned push-mower. They will even buy a low emission car that gets great gas mileage because they are conscious of the environment. Our lives have become very confusing, more than any other generations. Just by re-evaluating our living habits, we can make reasonable changes in our life-style decisions. Using environmentally friendly garden tools could be an excellent way to start making more earth friendly decisions in our lives.
Opening a website, and/or a store, that offers these old-fashioned tools could choose to be a very successful ‘business idea’. Why not become one of the first to offer these tools to the public. Making ‘green’ decisions in our lives today is becoming a popular new idea and many people are searching for new ways to make these changes. Take advantage of this new fad by offering ‘green ideas and products’; this will make you popular quickly.
Green Job Consultant
Using a push mower is much better for the environment than using the numerous gas mowers offered on the market today. Remember those simple push mowers that didn’t use gas? You had to use your muscles to get them going and cutting the grass was sometimes a hard job if you didn’t keep the grass mowed on a regular basis. Make these mowers available for people to purchase, they sometimes can be very hard to find.
Do you remember what gardening was like before there were leaf-blowers irritating the majority of the neighborhood? They are such a nuisance, except to the person using them. Offer people good old-fashioned, well-made brooms and rakes to accomplish these jobs. You might even have to educate some people in how to go about using these earth friendly tools instead of relying on leaf blowers, vacuums, and all.
You could even help the world economy and green movement by offering simple hand tools made from natural products by people in very poor countries. Let your customers decide if they want to choose to help-out by purchasing some good quality items that will be earth friendly, when they eventually need replacing. The world market is also an extremely popular concern today for many earth conscious people. Take advantage of this new movement, for good quality products that can help your customers do their gardening with tools they are happy about purchasing.
Educating customers about how to go about accomplishing gardening tasks could be a great idea for you to make important on your website, even offering new ideas and possibly offering a newsletter about these products on a regular basis. Adjusting these articles according to the seasons would be helpful too. Help your customers not only use earth friendly tools
Environmental Activism: Need A Job, This Job Is For You!
Posted on October 6, 2011
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Eco Building Consultant
You have saved your pennies, bought a nice piece of land, and have been pre-approved on a home loan to start building your new house. You are committed to being as green as you can fiscally afford to be. After all, no one is perfect. However, before you can begin building the green home of your dreams, you have to figure out who to call to make this happen. After all, it isn’t as if you can just look up “green home builders” in the phone book and have them build you a home. Or, can you?
Eco Building Consultant
You can start a business as an ‘Eco Building Consultant’ to fill this growing market need. People want to do what is best for the environment but really have no clue about how to get the process started, when it comes to finding contractors and designers that make environmentally friendly choices when it comes to building materials and building plans for a new home. As an Eco Building Consultant, you will perform much the same as a wedding planner does for the bride before a wedding. You need to find out what the homeowner has in mind. Then you contact vendors on their behalf, sit down with the homebuilder and the vendor, and hash out the details until the homeowner is pleased with the plans.
When consulting with a potential homebuilder, you must first find out what kind of financial constraints you will be working with. Many environmentally friendly products will cost more than similar building materials that are lower quality, full of toxic chemicals, and that have other environmentally unfriendly characteristics. Next, you will need to find out which area of the home is the most important focus for them. In some cases, a potential homebuilder will be unfamiliar with the options that are available to them. You will need to discuss every detail of the construction of a home, educating them on the many options available to them, before knowing which vendor will be appropriate for their needs.
Some people may be able to afford a home built with eco-friendly materials from the foundation to the nails used to hold the roof on. For them, the sky is the limit and you will have an easier time negotiating with vendors to get these services done, since money will not be a limiting factor. For other people, they may be more concerned with the materials used on the interior of the home and its insulation features. Others may be focused on constructing a home that creates its own energy and uses very little fuel to run on a daily basis. Still others will be more focused on using materials that are available locally so that they are creating a smaller carbon footprint to import them in. Since most people have differing ideas on just what their idea of a green home is, every homebuilder will have different goals and needs.
As an Eco Building Consultant, you would be educating your clients on how they can be more environmentally friendly when building a home or business. You’ll be paid to offer suggestions to your clients on how to take better care of their things so it has less of an impact on the environment. Teach being green. You could be consulting a developer on several different properties, as well as a homeowner on what kind of heating or cooling system they should buy to become more energy efficient and environmentally friendly.
Aspen Institute Highlights 10 Ways EPA Has Strengthened America Over the Past 40 Years/List by group of environmental thought leaders unveiled as Agency commemorates 40th anniversary (HQ)
Posted on December 18, 2010
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WASHINGTON – The Aspen Institute – an international nonprofit dedicated to
fostering enlightened leadership and open-minded dialogue – today unveiled a
list of 10 ways the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has strengthened
America over the past 40 years. The unveiling of the Aspen Institut…
EPA to Remove and Replace Lead-Contaminated Soils at 11 Schools, 16 Child Care Facilities in St. Francois County, Mo. (MO)
Posted on December 15, 2010
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Environmental News
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
(Kansas City, Kan., November 19, 2010) – EPA Region 7 today announced plans to
remove and replace soils at 11 schools and 16 child care centers and Head Start
facilities in St. Francois County, Mo., because recent testing has confirmed
elevated …
EPA Recognizes Sustainable Communities with Smart Growth Awards (HQ, CA, ME, MD, NY, OR)
Posted on December 14, 2010
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WASHINGTON – The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) today recognized
five projects with the 2010 National Award for Smart Growth Achievement for
their comprehensive approach to improving quality of life. The projects make
cities safer and more pleasant for pedestrians and bicyclists, m…
Source:EPA Recognizes Sustainable Communities with Smart Growth Awards (HQ, CA, ME, MD, NY, OR)
U.S. EPA: City and County of San Francisco, Intel Corporation Among Prestigious National Award Winners Advancing Emerging Green Power Markets (CA)
Posted on December 10, 2010
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Bay Area recipients honored for leading green power purchases, projects
SAN FRANCISCO — The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Green Power
Partnership will tonight award 18 National Green Power Partners for their
achievements in using green power, helping to grow the nation’s voluntary gr…
EPA Reports a Successful Year Enforcing Environmental Law in U.S. Virgin Islands (VI)
Posted on December 10, 2010
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(New York, NY) The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency today posted information illustrating its very successful past year in enforcing environmental law. In the past federal fiscal year, which ran from October 1, 2009 through September 30, 2010, the Agency took actions that reduced pollution and…
Source:EPA Reports a Successful Year Enforcing Environmental Law in U.S. Virgin Islands (VI)
Oregon?s Bear Creek Cleaner Thanks to Watershed-Wide Projects (OR)
Posted on December 7, 2010
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Local groups, armed with a protection plan and $5.4 million in state & federal
funding dramatically improve water quality in Bear Creek
(Seattle – Nov. 18, 2010) After years of hard work by local groups and $5.4
million in state and federal investment, areas of Bear Creek watershed are
sho…
Source:Oregon?s Bear Creek Cleaner Thanks to Watershed-Wide Projects (OR)
MONDAY: Administrator Jackson to Kick Off EPA at 40 Commemoration / Weeklong series of events to highlight EPA?s 40 years protecting American communities (HQ)
Posted on December 7, 2010
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WASHINGTON – U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Lisa P.
Jackson will hold several events kicking off a weeklong commemoration of EPA’s
40th Anniversary on Monday.
Monday morning, the Aspen Institute will unveil their list of EPA’s most
significant achievements over the…