Tesla Motors has found a new application for its battery technology — off-grid solar-powered homes. The automaker is teaming up with solar panel installer SolarCity to connect its batteries to solar-powered homes, unlinking the panels from the grid and using the batteries as back-up.

The team has submtited applications for 70 different projects to California utility PG&E’s solar incentive program that would see homes linked together with Tesla battery packs and solar panels. The batteries would store energy produced by the panels for use during the night, on cloudy days and during grid power outages, allowing the homes to operate fully free of the grid.

The partnership is relying on incentives to get the projects moving. If the projects qualify for the California incentives and federal tax incentives, the cost of these installations could be cut in half, making them much more appealing to homeowners since solar panel installations are already expensive and those coupled with battery storage would be even more so. But if they can get the costs down and market this combined system, we could see off-grid living become much more approachable.

Incandescent light bulbs are really little space heaters with a side benefit of producing some light. They are an old technology that is being phased out for many applications by more efficient alternatives. Now, in addition to the LEDs and CFLs, we can add ESL bulbs, which have started to reach the market, to the available technologies.

We’ve been watching for Electron Stimulated Luminescence (ESL) lighting technology for a few years. It is now commercially available with the introduction of the Vu1 bulb. ESL lighting uses an electron gun to stimulate a phosphor coated surface for illumination, much like an old CRT or television tube. The bulb is actually a vacuum, with no mercury (or anything else) inside it, so disposal and recycling is easier.

The Vu1 bulb has an expected lifespan of 11,000 hours, which can be 5 times that of an incandescent and close to that of a good CFL. It uses 19.5 watts to produce 500 lumens, so it falls in between CFL and incandescent in efficacy. The color-rendering index (CRI) of the ESL bulb is 90+, again falling between an average CFL with a CRI of 80 and an incandescent with a CRI of 100.

Street pricing for the Vu1 is about $15*. That’s more expensive than a CFL these days, but that’s in the range of what CFLs were a decade ago, and LEDs with this color quality aren’t at this price level, either. For further information and a more subjective review of the light, you can read a longer review about the Vu1 light on my personal blog.

[Disclaimer: Vu1 provided the sample bulb to me at no charge for my review.]

[* Edited to add: After posting this yesterday, I got a call from William Smith, the chairman of Vu1. One thing he wanted to emphasize is that the company expects the price for this bulb to be less than $10 within 18 months, as production ramps up which is in the range of other dimmable bulbs.]

Four Austin area master-planned communities have been ranked on John Burns Real Estate Consulting    ’s list of 50 Top-Selling U.S. Master Planned Communities for 2011.

The ranking is based on the number of home sales in these communities in 2011. The Sun City Texas neighborhood, one of the nation’s largest age-restricted residential communities, is ranked No. 27 with sales of 226 homes at year’s end.

Crystal Falls, a 5,000-acre master-planned community in Leander took the 29th spot with 225 home sales. Taking the No. 33 spot is Round Rock’s 1,555-acre Teravista community with sales of 215 homes. Ranked at No. 39 is the Steiner Ranch development, a 4,600-acre, master-planned community in Northwest Austin which had 175 homes sales in 2011.

The Villages, an active adult community in the Orlando area, scored the top spot with 2,307 home sales.

John Burns Real Estate Consulting examined sales numbers from 131 projects across the United States. Home sales in master planned communities represented 23,000, or 7.6 percent, of the estimated 300,000 new sales in the United States in 2011.

The full report John Burns Real Estate Consulting    ’s list of 50 Top-Selling U.S. Master Planned Communities for 2011.

The ranking is based on the number of home sales in these communities in 2011. The Sun City Texas neighborhood, one of the nation’s largest age-restricted residential communities, is ranked No. 27 with sales of 226 homes at year’s end.

Crystal Falls, a 5,000-acre master-planned community in Leander took the 29th spot with 225 home sales. Taking the No. 33 spot is Round Rock’s 1,555-acre Teravista community with sales of 215 homes. Ranked at No. 39 is the Steiner Ranch development, a 4,600-acre, master-planned community in Northwest Austin which had 175 homes sales in 2011.

The Villages, an active adult community in the Orlando area, scored the top spot with 2,307 home sales.

John Burns Real Estate Consulting examined sales numbers from 131 projects across the United States. Home sales in master planned communities represented 23,000, or 7.6 percent, of the estimated 300,000 new sales in the United States in 2011.

Austin Energy   released a new recommendation Thursday for its proposed electric rate increase.

The utility suggested keeping the 12.5 percent average rate increase but divide it into two phases. The first would include raising rates by 8.7 percent this year, and increasing the rate again by 3.8 percent in 2014. Some Austin City Council members are skeptical about the new plan. Residents have expressed concern over how the rate increase would impact them.

The energy company said the increase would help it stay out of the red and would be the first rate hike in 17 years.

The Austin American-Statesman has more.

Texas is among the top 10 states in the U.S. for its square footage of commercial and institutional green buildings per capita.

The US Green Building Council  is out with its annual list of Top 10 states for LEED-certified Commercial Property Per Capita, and Texas ranks No. 8 with 1.99 square feet of LEED-certified space per resident in 2011.

In all, Texas boasts 50 million square feet of LEED-certified development.

Washington, D.C., ranked first with 31.50 square feet of LEED-certifed space for each resident.

The USGBC counts nearly 19 million square feet of LEED-certified construction in D.C., compared to 71.5 million green square feet in California, ranking California ninth on the per capita list, as 1.92 square feet per resident.

View the full press release.

ALPINE – The Texas AgriLife Extension Service will conduct Rainwater Catchment and Landscaping in Times of Drought from 9 a.m.-3 p.m. Nov. 30 in the Brewster County Courthouse Annex-Commissioners Courtroom in Alpine.
The seminar is a joint effort between the AgriLife Extension offices in Presidio and Brewster/Jeff Davis counties.
Three Texas Department of Agriculture continuing education units – two general and one integrated pest management – will be available for those with a private applicator’s license.
“Dry weather is a fact of life in far West Texas, but the drier it gets, the more important it is to ‘catch and hold’ what rain we do receive through rainwater harvesting equipment and by planting water-smart landscapes,” said Jesse Lea Schneider, AgriLife Extension agent in Presidio County. “That’s what this seminar is all about. We want to bring homeowners up to date on the latest in rainfall harvesting and water-friendly landscape strategies, and we think we have the topics and speakers to accomplish that.”
The seminar topics will include: an overview of rainwater harvesting; recycling in the landscape; water quality of wells and rainwater; and winter care of rainwater harvesting systems, native landscape plants and trees.
The seminar will conclude with a tour of a recycling facility.
Individual registration is $10 due at the door.
For more information, contact Schneider at 432-729-4746, jlschneider@ag.tamu.edu ,or Logan Boswell, AgriLife Extension agent in Brewster/Jeff Davis Counties at 432-837-6207, l-boswell@tamu.edu.

Finding ways to cut your electricity bill doesn’t have to be complicated. In fact, it’s the simple choices we make that can have the biggest impact. In Adria Vasil’s newest book, Ecoholic Home, Canada’s favourite “ecoholic” reminds us that cracking down on old energy-wasting habits around the house will help ease the drain on your bank account. “Just ask your grandparents,” she writes. “Saving energy, saving resources—saves you money.” Plus, reducing your energy needs will ultimately benefit your whole community.

So try these 7 small things before the snow falls:

Tip #1: Crank It Down

In winter, turn your thermostat down by two degrees and wear a sweater. Honestly, it will save you $180 per year or more on your energy bill (and just think of the huge energy savings around your province if everyone did this). Some even say it saves you 5% on your bill for every degree you crank it down!

Tip #2: Morning and Evening Retreat

A low-flow shower head requires less water and therefore needs less heat to warm the water. You can also insulate your water tank and set the thermostat two degrees lower to save energy. The ideal range is between 60 and 65 degrees Celsius. If you have a set thermostat, this range is midway between “warm normal” or “low medium”. We assure you, you’ll never even notice the difference.

Did you know that you can also save up to 8 gallons of water a day simply by turning off the tap while you brush your teeth in the morning and at night. That adds up to a lot of water savings! Do the same while you shave, and save even more!

Tip #3: Clean Heat

Cleaning your furnace filter every two months can increase its efficiency by 50 percent. Seriously. We know, that’s simple!

Tip #4: Timing is Everything

Install a timer on your water heater and furnace to turn it off at night and back on just before you wake up in the morning.

Few people realize that waiting to do electricity-heavy activities (such as laundry or showering) before 7 am and after 10 pm can reduce your energy usage and costs dramatically. In fact, most provinces now raise electricity rates in the daytime or prime time, making it smarter than ever to wait until later to run your appliances. Check with your energy provider and see how you can save.

Tip #5: Beware of Phantoms

Unplug home electronics when you’re not using them. Most of them have features that make them easier to use—instant-on TVs, for instance—that also suck up electricity, even when they’re not in use. This can amount to $75 in energy costs per year. Be sure to turn off your computer too, when you are finished with it for the day.

Here’s an interesting computer fact:

If all computers sold in the U.S. met ENERGY STAR requirements, the savings in energy costs would grow to $1.8 billion each year, reducing greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to those from more than 2 million vehicles.

Tip #6: Dry Smart

Dry two or more loads of laundry in a row to take advantage of an already warm dryer. Remove clothes from the dryer when they’re still warm to prevent wrinkling. And, clean the lint filter before every load. A clogged filter can increase energy use by up to 30 percent and also present a safety hazard.

Tip #7: Light Solutions

Replace your home’s incandescent light bulbs with CFL or LED bulbs. You’ll save energy with the lower wattage it takes to power the bulb but also from reduced cooling costs—incandescent bulbs give off 90 percent of their energy as heat.

Hope some of these help you save even more this winter. We’d love you to share your favourite energy saving tips with us. It helps us all.

The move away from big, centralized, massive-scale organization seems to be on. The Internet gives us an archetype of the decentralized, horizontally organized entity that thrives without a hierarchical structure of authority. It is mirrored in political movements such as the Occupy movement, whose birth it midwifed, as well as in many economic developments.

All this is a roundabout way to say something about energy production, but bear with me, please.

We are nearing the end of the fossil fuel era. The peak of oil is approaching (or here), and all forms of fossil fuels are becoming harder (and more environmentally destructive) to extract as the easily reachable deposits are exhausted. In addition, climate change is making energy sources other than fossil fuels increasingly attractive. Solar power is high on the list of alternatives.

But what’s interesting about solar power, aside from its green credentials and inexhaustible supply, is that it lends itself much like the Internet to a decentralized approach, with less in the way of large-scale mass production of energy and more in the way of energy produced for the individual home or commercial building. It is literally power produced on the roof and behind the garage door rather than in the megawatt-generating centralized power utility.

This is not to say that there will be no centralized solar power generation in our future. The difference is one of degree and not of absolutes.

Solar power is inherently diffuse. The amount of sunlight falling on the planet is enough to meet the entire energy demand of the whole human race some 8,700 times over, but it’s spread out over the whole planet and most of it goes to keep the water liquid and feed plant life. Because solar energy is so widely spread out, it lends itself to small-scale, decentralized application rather than to large-scale, concentrated power production.

We see this already in the market for solar power, which is dominated by smaller-scale installations. As the price of photovoltaic cells and solar panels continues to drop, the attractiveness of a home solar system that can supplement and partially replace energy from the commercial grid continues to increase. In a nicely logical move given the Internet/solar power parallel noted above, Google is investing $75 million to offer home solar systems to homeowners for either no money down or very little down, with the company receiving a fee for the power generated, which is expected to be equal to or less than their current power costs.

The economy of the future is likely to feature solar power generation as a standard feature of every building in most parts of the country and, as a result, greatly reduced centralized power generation. In the production of electricity as in other areas, it will be a less centralized world.

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Photo credit:  Some rights reserved by mechanikat

The first 100 percent renewable energy-powered data center in the U.S. will be built in Pflugerville, bringing with it a total investment of $210 million and 130 new jobs over the next 10 years.

The Pflugerville Economic Development Corp. announced that WindData, owned by Austin-based Baryonyx Corp., will start construction on the five-building data center campus totaling more than 600,000 square feet in the first half of 2012.

The PCDC board of directors approved a three-phase incentive agreement on Nov. 3 that is based mostly on jobs.

Phase I, which includes $70 million of capital investment over three years, is contingent on 30 jobs with health insurance benefits paying $67,500 annually. Phases II and III, which include an additional $140 million of capital investment, are contingent upon an additional 100 jobs with the same requirements.

“We see the city’s proximity to the growing Austin business community and its location in a deregulated energy market as the key drivers in our decision to develop future facilities in Pflugerville,” said Baryonyx Corp. CEO Ian Hatton.

Tax assistance agreements must be finalized with both Williamson and Travis counties to be able to proceed with the final build, Hatton said.

WindData, a site selection client of Angelou Economics, is seeking primary data center and disaster recovery tenants prior to breaking ground on the first building.

Turning your home into a more energy efficient and environmentally friendly construct can be a daunting task, especially if it was originally built long before green went mainstream. Not long ago, trying to find environmentally friendly alternatives in home building was like searching for a needle in a haystack. These days it’s easier to find green products, but turning your older home into an example of green living can often feel like an overwhelming project.

It doesn’t have to be, though. If you’re not beginning with new construction where you can start green from the foundation up, you can gradually turn your home into a more energy efficient habitat through simple steps, one project at a time. Approaching your home piecemeal will be friendly to your budget as well as the environment.

These days there’s a green alternative for almost every aspect of the home, even garage doors. Yes, the largest moving part of your home can now be replaced with a green alternative. Despite its size, garage doors are often one of the most overlooked areas of the home for energy loss.

How many times have you stepped into the garage and experienced a significant temperature change? The traditional garage door isn’t well insulated, and over the years, we’ve come to accept that the garage will always be cooler or hotter than the rest of the house. Not only are old wooden garage doors inefficient, they also tax the environment.

Depending on the company, you should be able to find a garage door that is constructed with a wood alternative. Non-wood doors can be attractive and low maintenance. Many companies will insulate the door using recycled materials, as well. This translates directly into energy savings and a decrease in the monthly utility bill. Depending on the company and how the garage door is made, you may even qualify for energy tax credits.

Purchasing a garage door from a green company also means investing in their environmentally conscious business. Green companies typically have cleaner, more efficient manufacturing practices. They must meet the strict EPA manufacturing guidelines. Often they use less packaging and are invested in cleaner, more efficient methods of shipping. They may also recycle the scrap metal that’s produced when manufacturing the garage door. So you’re not only purchasing a green product for your home, you’re promoting greener manufacturing.

Tackling one project at a time around the house will pay off in savings and will prevent you from feeling overwhelmed. Starting with something as simple as replacing a garage door can be the perfect beginning on the path to greener living. Remember, small, simple steps build up to a big impact.

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