My response? Duh! We need to do BOTH. And even then we may not have [...]]]>

Here is a crap article by the New York Times arguing that in order to stop global warming we need to pick between either sacrificing (consuming less) OR picking greener options of consumption (so we can consume the same).

My response? Duh! We need to do BOTH. And even then we may not have a chance at saving most of ecology.

They point out accurately that if people have to pick between green and comfort they will always pick comfort.

Humans are about getting ahead. We have taken over the planet because of our ruthless survival skills. And we will continue to grow and plunder until the very last drop of resources are available. This I have come to accept, although very cynically, from my personal experience as a NY green contractor.

Even my most die hard green clients for green brownstone renovations in New York at the end of the day care more about comfort than anything, by far. They don’t like to admit it because it would rip into their green self image but the planet, the contractor, the neighbors, all of these things are WAY behind in importance to their own survival.

Obviously, you might say.

The problem with being a green contractor is that the fall from innocence is painful because we start with such high expectations. Normal contractors are already jaded. They know the ugly truth that the client wants as much as they can get for as little as they can pay, and the contractor in turn acts the same. It is brutal survival of the fittest but business is honest that way.

Nature is too I guess. Maybe humans, despite being the most brutal animal in the kingdom, is also the most delusionally idealistic.

Green contractors are the worst when it comes to this idealism.

We enter into a pact with green minded people to help save the world. There is an expectation of brotherly love and universal saving. But this feel good pact immediately shatters when the client comfort and safety is threatened (not enough money, DOB issues, deadline problems, and the million other things that can go wrong in a renovation).

On this the New York Times article and myself agree.

But they then try to make a case for the EITHER OR, juxtaposing two things that in my eyes BOTH should be done.

They say, instead of making people sacrifice and use less, lets just make their tools emit less CO2:

…switch to cleaner diesel engines and cookstoves, building more efficient kilns and coke ovens, capturing methane at landfills and oil wells, and reducing methane emissions from rice paddies by draining them more often.

This strikes me as even more delusional. Head in the sand delusional. Lets not worry about consumption. Lets just build more Hybrid cars.

The Rockaway Beach Branch Committee is petitioning the New York City Council to turn an abandoned 3.5 mile stretch of the old Rockaway Beach Branch railroad into a green [...]]]>

Check out this petition on change.org.  We think their proposal to turn an abandoned tract of land into green space will benefit many New Yorkers.

The Rockaway Beach Branch Committee is petitioning the New York City Council to turn an abandoned 3.5 mile stretch of the old Rockaway Beach Branch railroad into a green space.

Rail service ended 60 years ago, and the city and MTA have indicated that they have no intention of reactivating the rail line due to financial and logistical concerns.  The land has sat there as a dumping ground, a waste of a large unused tract of land in an area populated by hundreds of thousands.

The proposed green space connects nearby communities, recreational areas, and public transportation lines.   The project echoes the recently completed High Line park in Manhattan, which recycled old railroad into an urban park.  In addition to cultural benefits, urban parks have economic perks: turning the unused space into a green gathering place has stimulated real estate development along the 1-mile strip.

The High Line’s southern end in 2005, before renovation.

Completed central portion of the High Line in 2010

In addition to greening New York through construction, Eco Brooklyn also does ecological gardening. We use native plants and local resources like stones, tree trunks and rain water to recreate natural native landscapes. We are a big fan of the Manhattan High Line as a successful example of using an abandoned space to increase community and nature with native plants.

Sign the petition, and help recycle wasted space into a green zone today!

What the land looks like now.  Read and sign the petition here.

Image courtesy of LIRR Rockaway Beach Branch Virtual Tour.

The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) met in Durban over the past two months in order to hammer out a plan for extending the Kyoto Protocol. [...]]]>

We’re Brooklyn-based green builders dedicated to turning our local neighborhood green, but we’re always following the latest developments in global standards for more sustainable living.

The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) met in Durban over the past two months in order to hammer out a plan for extending the Kyoto Protocol. The UNFCC is the body of the UN that is in charge of pulling together all the countries under one unified agreement on how to handle important climate issues. Getting 194 nations to agree is no small task.

Stressed out: Conference President Maite Nkoana-Mashabane of South Africa

The main focus of this year’s talks was to establish a binding agreement that would build upon the Kyoto Protocol by applying the same emission limits to all nations regardless of industrialization.  The U.K., for example, would be held to the same standard as India, even though the U.K. is highly developed with a high average standard of living–in contrast with India, where hundreds of millions still live in poverty.

The greatest conflict erupted between the E.U. and India, due to the E.U.’s determination to lay out a “road map” for a legally binding agreement for all nations.  Developing industrial powers led by India and China argued fiercely against what they saw as an unfair constraint on projects that would improve standards of living nationwide.

They make a compelling argument: first world nations achieved their high standards of living through decades of environmentally damaging industrialization, so why should rising nations have to pay the price through limits on their own development?  India, especially, refused to sign off on an as-yet-undefined “road map” that they viewed as signing away their future development rights.

The Kyoto Protocol, first established in 1997, was a global agreement to limit emissions in the interest of sustainability.  191 nations have signed it so far, but the U.S. is still holding out because we refuse to accept the point that nations are held to different emissions criteria depending on development status.

Grey: undecided nations/Red: nations with no intention of ratifying.

The U.S., as the only major power not bound by the Kyoto Protocol, stayed mostly quiet in the Durban brawl but will add a third dimension to finalizing an equally binding agreement.  Did we refuse to ratify the Kyoto Protocol because we didn’t want to be held to different standards than developing nations, or because we didn’t want to be bound at all?  Will we throw around our economic and political clout in further attempts to avoid emissions regulations?  Will the agreement conceptualized in Durban become a reality?

So, what was really accomplished on Sunday?  Not much, according to most commentators.  It’d be easy to bash the agreement as an inadequate solution, but let’s focus on the hard-won victories:

1. Compromise was achieved between the E.U. and India/China.  All nations agreed for a legally binding framework to be completed by 2015 and implemented by 2020.
2. There’s a definite timeline: work on the new agreement will start next year.
3. Nations confirmed the Green Climate Fund, which was first agreed on in Copenhagen in 2009.  An as yet undetermined body under the U.N. will oversee the fund, which is to provide $100 billion a year by 2020 to help developing nations adapt to problems posed by climate change.  The exact terms for the fund remain vague, with no definite plan on where the money is to come from or how much is already in the fund.

Our dream is to turn New York green, one brownstone at a time, so we understand the necessity of taking very small steps to achieve a greater goal, but the talks’ tendency toward compromise and vague planning represent procrastination rather than progress.  But still, I guess it’s a good thing that the climate conversation is still grinding on, one year at a time.

Click through for the official UNFCCC Durban website.

The body creates two types of waste, so the logical approach is a toilet capable of two types of flush: a gentle gurgle for liquid waste and a more generous gush for solid waste, resulting in water conservation through [...]]]>

New York green contractors and homeowners are applying a modern innovation to an age-old technology.

The body creates two types of waste, so the logical approach is a toilet capable of two types of flush: a gentle gurgle for liquid waste and a more generous gush for solid waste, resulting in water conservation through more efficient performance.

Dual flush toilets originated in Australia and have gained popularity through government rebates for homeowners converting from old single flush toilets.  In America, dual flush toilets are also catching on among conservation-conscious green contractors and policy-makers.

The Energy Policy Act of 1992 mandates that toilets must use no more than 1.6 gallons per flush.  Dual flush toilets push this limit further by using only a half flush, less than a gallon, for liquid waste and reserving the full flush for solid wastes.

Dual flush toilets are also widely available for the homeowner: leading brands like Kohler and American standard offer many models, and while dual flush toilets tend to be more expensive and complex than their single flush cousins, Amazon now sells retrofitting kits that allow homeowners to convert their own toilets for as little as $22.95.

As a practical downside dual flush toilets generally need more frequent cleaning, but homeowners can also refer to a toilet’s Maximum Performance (MaP) score to purchase a toilet that meets their needs.  Scores range from 250-1000: the higher the number, the more powerful the flush.  A high efficiency toilet, which can use as little as 1 gallon per flush, is required by the EPA to operate at a minimum MaP score of 350, sufficient for daily household use.

Let’s calculate each toilet’s daily water consumption, assuming the average person defecates once and urinates six times during the course of the day.

Single flush: 7 flushes x 1.6 gal/flush = 11.2 gal

Dual flush: (1 flush x 1.6 gal/flush) + (6 flushes x 0.8 gal/flush) = 6.4 gal

High efficiency: 7 flushes x 1 gal/flush = 7 gal

The dual flush toilet still wins out in overall efficiency (0.91 gal/flush), but only when used properly.   High efficiency toilets are another great option that simplify the process and can potentially be cheaper to purchase.  Either way, as green-conscious builders and homeowners in America struggle to catch up to Australian and European counterparts, expect to see many more of these innovative toilets replacing standard ones in both public buildings and private homes.

Harvard installed dual-flush toilets as part of their commitment to moving toward sustainable facilities and maintenance.  Click through for more examples of energy-efficient and green technology in Harvard’s buildings.

I think it’s pretty cool that green building is at a point where resources like [...]]]>

Eco Brooklyn recently obtained a copy of McGraw Hill’s Green Building: Square Foot Costbook 2012. Construction cost data books are intended for use by planners and builders who would like to get a quick, rough idea of how much a job might cost.

I think it’s pretty cool that green building is at a point where resources like this are being published, making it easier for conventional builders to consider getting into more sustainable practices. The book only offers a few dozen individual case studies, but this is still valuable information – when you consider that not knowing what costs to expect scares many builders away from switching to green. Or what also happens is the contractor overbids on the job to cover the unknowns, thus making it too expensive.

To some, green building is still some mysterious high technology developed by experts that people would purchase if only it wasn’t so darned expensive. On the other hand, as a New York green contractor, we feel green building is a common sense, affordable approach toward radical efficiency, developed side-by-side with an informed client. In short, it isn’t complicated or expensive.

McGraw Hill’s Green Building: Square Foot Costbook 2012 helps people understand this by putting numbers to the jobs, lifting the veil of mystery over what something should cost.

We want to see the green building industry grow not only in demand but also in supply. Our goal is to turn NY green, which is part of our thinking globally and acting locally strategy. So more green building companies may mean more competition but it also means a greener NY, which is what we really care about.

The demand is there so we don’t worry about there being enough business.

Hopefully this book will help non-green contractors be more confident on bidding on green jobs. The more of us there are working towards a greener world only helps Eco Brooklyn further our goals of sound ecology and social justice.

courtesy of Nausicaa Aquarium, France

This wood has [...]]]>

A typical thing happened today in the life of Eco Brooklyn. One of our workers noticed a dumpster full of wood and called it in to the office. I dispatched our “Rescue Truck”, Eco Brooklyn’s veggie oil pickup, to go salvage the wood before it was carted off to the dump.

This wood has sat in a brownstone for over 80 years. It is beautiful douglass fir, in the form of studs or joists. Nice thick wood with another hundred years of life left to it, at least. It is beautiful wood. You can sand it down and put oil on it for a kitchen counter or island. You can cut it down and use as siding. Or cut it into planks for flooring. Or put it back into a house simply as joists or studs. It is like art. Art direct from nature.

You can’t get this wood today. It comes from old trees and has had a hundred years to cure. It is part of a long ago history when wood was as abundant and healthy as the bison.

When the driver and helper got to the dumpster the workers on the site had started putting soil on top of the wood. We asked if the contractor would stop for a few minutes to give my guys time to take out the wood. We don’t push the ecological logic in this situation. We point out the financial logic that the dumpster will cost about $800 and if we take half the wood we save the contractor maybe $400.

But the contractor refused. So my guys worked frantically to save the wood as the other workers poured soil on top of it. We got only six beams before the soil became too much to move. We watched as they covered up the other sixty beams.

Today we didn’t succeed. Some days we do but it is a constant fight.

Throwing away this wood should be a crime. The waste is so saddening. Such ignorance, such arrogance.

It is so frustrating that this is legally and morally acceptable. Thousands of dumpsters a year, millions of board feet a year thrown into the trash heap.

Sometimes I think I am surrounded by insanity. Or maybe I am insane.

One client I met with today just came back from the Amazon forest recording sounds. He has been going for ten years. He says it is getting hard to go because the forest is disappearing so fast before his eyes he can’t bear the pain. He said on the plane he overheard some forest company workers joking about how they had lied to government officials about the origin of a certain tree in order to log it. They thought it was funny.

We live in a spiraling time where we have the power to destroy or save the planet in an astoundingly short time. Never in the history of humanity have we had this power. There is a crisis in the world. Wake up. Become humble. Do good.