2ACH Drop With Two Simple Changes

January 24, 2015

Jargon. I have always said we shouldn’t use jargon but there it is right in the title! 2ACH means 2 Air Changes Per Hour….which means that all the air in the volume being measured changes completely – twice – in one hour. In this case the volume being tested is our new townhouse. Last month, […]

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Finally! K-Cup Recycling!

January 23, 2015

Hallelujah someone has started an expensive but easy way to recycle K-Cups those pernicious yet convenient coffee dispensers. Note that it wasn’t Keurig who has accomplished this.  Terracycle together with OfficeMax have launched the fee based program in Canada. Although not available in the US yet, there is hope that a full scale launch will […]

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NYC Bans Single-use Styrofoam Products

January 21, 2015

In a move that may help the old Grecian paper cup make a huge come-back; effective 7/1/2015, NYC has banned single-use styrofoam products! There are is at least one well-known, national coffee chain that must be sitting back on its heels.  Hooray! EPS (expanded polystyrene) is already banned in six cities including: Washington, DC, Minneapolis, […]

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Use Energy Star Tool To Assess Your House

January 6, 2015

The Energy Star Home Advisor tool allows you to quickly and easily assess your home’s energy use vis-a-vis your participating neighbors and gives some practical, easy to do tasks to reduce energy use and increase efficiency.  It also assigns some pretty hefty tasks but you can feel good about yourself as you tick off the […]

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Vertical Living Offers New Challenges

January 2, 2015

People keep asking me what is most surprising about living in the city? Lots of things are different, surprising, and new but one of the most challenging is living vertically. When we lived in Raleigh, NC we had a ranch style house – one floor living – which was easy and efficient. Out in suburbia […]

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Bee Dance for Business Success

December 28, 2014

Check out the last three bullet-points in this article for some very pithy hints for our personal and business lives…hints from bees! Reprinted from the Philadelphia Beekeepers Guild newsletter December 28, 2014 In his research on the decision-making process of honey bees in a swarm cluster, Tom Seeley designed some exquisite experiments and carried them […]

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Recirculating Pump Solves 5-10 Minute Wait For Hot Water

December 18, 2014

Our new townhouse is tall – 5 stories tall.  The hot water heater is on the lowest level and the master bath is on the 4th floor.  It took a loooong time for the hot water to get from the heater to the spigot – sometimes 10 minutes of running the sink full throttle. That […]

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Lets Lose Plastic Bags in Philadelphia

December 17, 2014

There is a serious effort to ban plastic bags in NYC  lets encourage all of our cities and towns to join their effort. In the meantime: decide to not use plastic bags tell stores and vendors that you would rather use your own shopping bags. Encourage them to offer alternatives to plastic bags such as […]

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Plastic and our Oceans

December 15, 2014

Plastic is everywhere – try living without it for even a day and you become painfully aware of how it is ever present.  If we are to continue to use plastic we need to find better ways to dispose of it through recycling, reuse and transformation to raw materials. Check out this article in the […]

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Broken Washer = Water and Energy Savings

December 11, 2014

Well. We are basically moved in and settled. We have weathered and very much enjoyed our first holiday. Now we are looking around to see what we can do to make this townhouse as environmentally efficient as possible. But where to start? The decision was made for us. Start with the first thing that broke…the […]

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