The Green Economy. What a joke.

[Ted S.]

I'm in a bad mood this week as my states home performance program is looking like it is going nowhere. I am at a standstill with my HP program, scared to invest more as there is currently no market, and likely won't be. I swear they spout off about "green jobs" and all this "opportunity", it's really quite pathetic on the implementation side. The markets are all controlled here in MA, a hardworking young man, with an interest in building science, an entrepreneurial spirit, and a lifetime of building experience, in my mind is the most qualified individual for home performance - but can't even work in MA. The few good home performance companies I know of are actually SLOWING DOWN!!! There is no open free market for private industry, what happened to FREE ENTERPRISE??? Instead incentive money is given to a select few nonprofits with young kids with a 1 week course under their belt, there is no way to penetrate this market, there is no way grow a business, hire, and accomplish what this whole green economy was supposed to be about. The State of California well established the fact the the small independent contractors performing "test in, installation, test out" with a third party QA process (The BPI model) is absolutely the most effective means to get America efficient. The ACEEE also demonstrated the fact that efficiency is the most cost effective energy we have. I am so mad at all the garbage these days, all the talk, about windmills and weeds they want to make fuel out of.

What a Joke!!

Get real Washington!!

DOE Announces Funding Opportunity for Sustainable Bioenergy Feedstock Production
June 2, 2010
The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) today announced $5 million in funding for research focused on sustainable production of large quantities of non-food biomass for bioenergy. The intent of this Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) is to quantify and understand the environmental impacts of different strategies for producing large quantities of energy crops and other crop residues at the watershed scale. This is part of DOE’s commitment to expanding domestic bioenergy without negatively impacting environmental quality, biodiversity, and the availability of food, feed, fiber, and water.

[Allan Edwards]

Ted

Is the problem there the market or the government?

[Ted S.]

The market is grand, with all the available incentive money available, one would be unwise not to procure work for their home.

The government has (is currently) ruined the market, the non-profits have a lock on the incentive money, this can't be distributed by the private vendors to their customers. They are saying the private industry can still participate, and they want that, but what they don't understand is that this puts the private vendors at a business disadvantage. The playing field must be level or "spot on" for all participants to allow for a free open market.

The workforce is there, the market is there, money to incentivise is there, the current legislation is a barrier.

I have said it before and I will say it again:

Vice President Joe Biden's October 2009 Recovery Through Retrofit Plan is currently failing, yet we have still spent the money.

[David Meiland]

Ted, will Home Star change the picture there, if it passes?

[Dick Seibert]

Ted:

I've been telling you guys that the stimulus money is all going to keep government employees working:

Making magic with caulk, insulation and duct blasters, Contra Costa County weatherization specialist Brett Crowe can reduce a house’s energy waste by two-thirds in just half a day.

By late spring, thanks to $5 billion of stimulus funding, thousands of new weatherizers similar to Crowe will be sealing up low-income homes in the Bay Area and across the country. They will primarily come from the country’s 1.7 million unemployed construction workers, retrained as lean, greening machines.

These new weatherization hires will be some of the earliest manifestations of stimulus money in local communities. The East Bay will likely receive millions in additional funding, creating scores of new jobs.¹

The money is going to bio-fuels, solar and wind are never going to work because the environmentalists and NIMBYs are never going to allow it to work.

Harnessing the sun through solar panels is a great idea in principle, but harvesting stored solar energy from plants is a more promising and economical approach to help meet global energy needs, a UC Berkeley biosciences expert said Wednesday.

Former Stanford biologist Chris Somerville, who recently moved to the Berkeley campus to head the new Energy Biosciences Institute funded with half a billion dollars from BP, said the potential of photovoltaic technology for meeting the world's rapidly growing energy needs hasn't panned out in the 87 years since Einstein won the Nobel Prize for discovering the photoelectric effect.

A better bet, Somerville told a packed audience on campus, is to lay microscopic siege to the Earth's abundant plant cells, break down their walls and extract their sugars to produce alcohol for fuel.

It was the second public bruising of solar panels by a prominent UC Berkeley researcher within a few days.

Last week, the campus released a report by energy expert Severin Borenstein saying the costs of today's solar panels far outweigh the benefits. He said the money now spent on putting photovoltaic panels on homes and businesses would be better spent on research into improving them.

Somerville agreed that "direct solar" is too expensive.²

Now the students at Cal are protesting the half billion dollar grant from BP, fat chance Cal is going to give BP it's half billion back.



¹ http://510report.org/2009/03/11/weat...-the-bay-area/
² http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/articl...sn=001&sc=1000

[Ted S.]

Ted, will Home Star change the picture there, if it passes?

I hope so, although if you saw my update on the Cash for Caulkers thread there was a significant change to the Bill. I have been following the program for some time, it was initially to be a point of sale discount to the homeowner and has now just been converted to a Tax Credit product. That's a pretty major change in that they were heavily promoting how effective the point of sale aspect would be in contrast to the current $1500 Tax Credit deal.

I am also pretty upset at RESNET, the organization that administers the HERS Rater program. They have a new website, a new program for contractors called EnergySmart Contractors. There is a substantial fee to be advertised on their website. They have been promoting in the webinars and presentations I have attended that you have to act quick, when legislation passes it will be too late to join. I makes me mad, because they are pressuring folks to invest even before the program is in place. At the current time, Homestar doesn't even have funding, so one would be foolish to invest in something that is nothing more that wishful thinking.

What makes me the maddest is that it is quite achievable to put contractors back to work and at the same time make America more energy efficient. We have the models, the NY NSYERDA has shown us good examples for 15 years. BPI is another outstanding program, it is extremely effective and when followed properly it works very well. It's not that hard, we don't need windmills and weeds for biodiesil, lets do that after we pick the low hanging fruit??

If they can't get it together and get a open market for this HP industry with all the money out there they have now, then there is no hope for a sustainable home performance industry. I think it best just to stay informed at this point and make the move when the market has stabilized. Hopefully Homestar with make that happen.

[Ted S.]

I've been telling you guys that the stimulus money is all going to keep government employees working:

That's for sure. I can't tell you how mad I have become over this, so many guys out of work, so much work to be done (138 million inefficient homes) but so many new organizations, committees and bureaucrats - all they do is think up road blocks.

For God's sake, just implement BPI Standards Nationwide and open the market.

Let's get on with it!

At the end of the day it all comes down to hard work in getting the job done. My father in law says if they don't pour concrete, they don't get paid no matter how long it took to nail up the form work. That's all this "Green Economy" is about, nailing up forms. Maybe we should put a form here, maybe we should put a brace there. It all comes down to the fact they don't have the balls to order the concrete.

[Dick Seibert]

Ted:

Why would the government even want to support the private sector? My own congressman is sponsoring a bill to give local governments $75 billion to keep government workers employed.

Rep. Miller, is only too happy to bring home more pork to his state’s unionized government employees. The city of San Francisco is already planning on rehiring 17,000 laid off workers. In a city like San Francisco, over 9,000 employees earn at least $100,000 a year, and many, earn well over $200,000. Across the Bay smaller municipalities, about 15, are salivating over their share of tax money as well, expecting as much as $340 million between them.

H.R. 4812 would bail out union jobs for large cities and postpone large public sector layoffs until after election time. While many Americans are losing their jobs, having their wages frozen, or seeing their wages or salaries cut back along with all sorts of benefits, this newest scheme would keep the unionized government employees in the pink. Private sector workers will once again bailout the fat cats in the public sector and in the community organizations that have no constitutional right to taxpayer money. The ridiculous claim that one million jobs will be created by this legislation must be seen for what it is — a ludicrous lie to get Main Street Americans to look the other way while their money is being poured into the pockets of those who elected the present administration and Congress.¹

¹ http://www.nhteapartycoalition.org/t...r-america-act/

[ThingOfBeauty]

We have a great Property-Tax-Assessed loan program that is currently being held up by the banking lobby. Those guys rule the school.
Ted I find this whole mess really irritating too though the problems are slightly different here than there. 25% unemployment in construction, millions of houses leaking energy every day. If we could get the ball rolling, a couple of decades from now everyone in the country would be better off with lower energy bills and less pollution.

[Dick Seibert]

I realize that "Cash for Caulkers" is a humorous term derived from "Cash for Clunkers", and that caulking isn't necessarily a part of the proposed programs, but such programs shouldn't be entered into lightly because of the serious consequences of unknowledgeable/untrained people entering into such programs. Because of pending litigation I don't want to go into details at this time, but attached is a picture I took Thursday while my mold expert took tests, dual pane windows were "caulked into" a stucco apartment building a few months ago, spray foam was blown in around the edges, the caulking is leaking badly and mold is growing in the foam. The apartments will have to be vacated, a remediation company will have to remove all sheetrock, carpeting, insulation etc., HEPA air exhaust machines will be run until the mold is cleared and the apartments can be rebuilt. Windows are the biggest source of heat loss and gain, caulking in replacement windows is not something that can be done cheaply.

[davenorthup]

Dick - when you say replacement windows - are you describing fin less windows that sit in an old AL frame and have a few screws into the trimmers?

I have seen those and would never install them. Are they really still for sale? How could one possible flash that properly?

[Dick Seibert]

Yes Dave:

I have fought this fraud for years, they are still putting them in, they are generically called "Flush fin" windows, but go by other names, Milgard unbelievably calls their's "Z Bars" (There is nothing"Z" about them), I will say the one show is Simonton, they call their's "Stucco Flange".

Believe it or not, AAMA actually has an approved detail for installing them, of course nobody can actually follow it,

[Ted S.]

We have a great Property-Tax-Assessed loan program that is currently being held up by the banking lobby. Those guys rule the school.
Ted I find this whole mess really irritating too though the problems are slightly different here than there. 25% unemployment in construction, millions of houses leaking energy every day. If we could get the ball rolling, a couple of decades from now everyone in the country would be better off with lower energy bills and less pollution.

Doug, are you talking PACE? They are now running into resistance from Freddie and Fannie, not sure how it is going to pan out but I do support the program. I think getting to a financing model vs a Utility sponsored incentive would help open the market. I actually like the Homestar Bill now structured as a tax credit.

Efficiencyfirst.org is a good organization for guys in our situation to belong too. Best $250 I spent this year.

[betterdrywall]

sorryy Ted,,, meant to place the link on the other thread

[Ted S.]

I realize that "Cash for Caulkers" is a humorous term derived from "Cash for Clunkers", and that caulking isn't necessarily a part of the proposed programs, but such programs shouldn't be entered into lightly because of the serious consequences of knowledgeable/untrained people entering into such programs.

Spot on Dick, and the reason for my frustration. These programs pop up overnight and they throw millions at them. The result is they train relativity "green" folks, no pun intended, with no building construction background. Training consists of 1 week.

It's a disaster waiting to happen.

My argument is that experienced contractors, such as they guys on this forum should be doing this work. This is their livelihood, if they mess up a building they go back and fix it. It's their job, reputation, they have to get it right, they know more about buildings then any one out there.