Every house in a new 650-home development in Roseville, near our state capital in Sacramento, will have a solar roof, making it the largest all-solar neighborhood in the United States when it is finished around the end of this year, according to SunPower Corp., the California manufacturer supplying the solar electric system. Builder Lennar Corp. estimates that the homeowners will save an average of 40 to 60 percent on their monthly electric bills. (The photo doesn’t depict the Roseville setup but is a beautiful shot of solar panels courtesy of the SunPower Web site.)

Photo: surplusparts

The green building movement is starting to make serious progress, with individuals, governmental entities and developers choosing eco-friendly construction options, an environmental publication reported in its latest issue. 

Cities around the country, including San Francisco, are instituting laws that new public buildings be green. And 5 percent of new commercial construction today meets standards set by the U.S. Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design program (LEED), a voluntary standard for developing high-performance, sustainable buildings, E - The Environmental Magazine reported in its January/February 2007 issue. 

Eco-friendly construction is on the rise, from single-family houses and planned communities to schools, hospitals and other large built environments. Ten percent of new homes satisfy the federal government’s Energy Star guidelines, meaning they’re nearly one-third more energy-efficient than regulations require, according to the report.

Still, considering that U.S. buildings put out about a third of the country’s greenhouse gasses, at the rate green building is penetrating the market today, it will be many years before emissions can be cut by the 70 percent thought necessary to stabilize global climate, Ed Moss, the magazine’s publisher, said.

A number of cities around the country, including San Francisco (and neighboring Pleasanton, Berkeley and San Mateo), Boston, Seattle and Scottsdale, Arizona, are leading the way with laws that require new public buildings be green.

But we’re not exactly home free yet. Obstacles abound, Moss said. Part of the problem is the resistance to change and refusal by some professionals to learn new methods. And the technology will continue to cost more until economies of scale are realized.

And there are doubters, Moss said. Some question whether the term “green building” is too easily co-opted for marketing purposes. Some builders, they charge, do little more than erect townhouses that increase urban density rather than build energy-efficient products that are truly lighter on the land. Critics wonder whether efficiency standards, when applied, can be objectively proven to deliver desired results — such as lower electric bills. Historic preservationists bristle at a perceived bias toward new edifices thrown up at the expense of older buildings that could instead be sustainably retrofitted while maintaining the character of a community.

What do you think? Are we making serious progress, or is eco-friendly building merely becoming fashionable?

Photo:www.peteykins.com

Only one. But the light bulb has to want to change.

Photo:www.dorisday.net

Only one, but she has to be pro-conservation and willing to exchange her old, energy-guzzling regular bulbs for energy-efficient compact fluorescent bulbs. Who said blondes are stupid?

 Zut alors! Wal-Mart, the ginormous U.S. ”big box” chain many greenies love to hate, appears to be changing its spots. Well, at least, it’s changing its light bulbs, according to the New York Times. (How many big boxes does it take to change a light bulb?)

Uh, the deal is, not only is the Bentonville, Ark.-based national chain reported to be putting up buildings with solar roofs, it’s also pushing compact fluorescent light bulbs, described by some as “those funny-looking swirly things that have been showing up in greater numbers lately on supermarket and hardware store shelves.”

If every U.S. household replaced its light bulbs with energy-efficient compact fluorescent bulbs, the cumulative effect would lower our annual carbon dioxide emissions by about 125 billion pounds, according to the Earth Day Web site. So it’s a big, big deal when a store like this puts, as the Times expressed it, “marketing muscle” behind the idea. (Photo: monochrome on flickr.)

Photo: Michael Tyas 

2006 was an amazingly green year, and it looks as though 2007 has every chance of hitting even greener heights. In 2006, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed the nation’s first environmental law committing California to lowering its greenhouse gas production to 1990 levels by 2020. The governor set up an international program giving manufacturers incentives to lower carbon emissions. He also says he’ll oppose any attempt to drill for oil off California’s coast. (This did not escape national notice; check out this Washington Post article, “Schwarzenegger remakes himself as environmentalist.”)  It was that kind of a year, with President Bush saying in his January 2006 State of the Union speech that “America is addicted to oil” to fuel our transportation, and thereby our economy and society. Then in May, our president said “it’s worth trying to find out” if wind could provide 20% of the U.S. electricity requirements. (For more national developments, check out this blog post on “Seeking Alpha.”) Solar energy firms flourished in the Bay Area, including Berkeley’s Sun Light and Power, and so did alternative fuels; Chevron launched a giant hydrogen fuel cell at Santa Rita Jail that provides much of the energy for the facility – along with solar roof panels. And on and on. Who knows what 2007 will bring? But the outlook seems sunny, to say the least.