SLM AT HOME | Secretary of the Interior

The MYTH of Compact Fluorescent Lamps

By Jamie Briesemeister, DesignSpeak Contributor

 

Energy conservation has become a hot topic over the past few years.  Consumers are urged to turn off lights, use less hot water, and switch to compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs) in place of incandescent bulbs.  I agree with the first two points, but I take issue with idea of switching every light bulb in one’s house to CFLs.  While they do have substantial energy savings over incandescent lamps, they also have a handful of negative traits that are rarely discussed as frequently.  Here’s what you may not know:

 

·      CFLs contain mercury.  Lamps that are unbroken pose a minimal health hazard – but as soon as they are tossed in the trash and end in a landfill, they are going to break.  Once this happens, people may be exposed to toxic levels of mercury vapor and/or other metals, which can be breathed easily – or easily absorbed by the ground in landfills.  Proper cleanup and disposal procedures should be followed to prevent mercury poisoning.   See web links and numbers at the end of this article for proper disposal information.

 

·      Most CFLs are not designed for dimming.   Dimming CFLs can damage the bulb and/or dimmer that controls it – thus shortening lamp life.  For screw-in CFLs that are dimmable, proper ‘burn-in’ or ‘seasoning’ procedures should occur before dimming occurs.  Even then, when dimmed they often dim to 20% or so, then shut off abruptly—or—they flicker.  Higher performance light fixtures are available, but are not size or price-matched with screw-in CFLs.

 

·      When CFLs are dimmed appropriately, they do not become visibly ‘warmer’.  The color instead looks blue-white, making the environment look washed out and skin, pasty… A stark contrast to the warm white color often desired for a pleasant and relaxing ambiance.

 

·      CFLs should really be used in areas where lights will be left on for a lengthy period of time.  When used in areas where the light is switched on and off frequently, CFLs tend to have a shortened lifespan.

 

·      Utility or work spaces are best for CFLs.  According to the Home Lighting Control Alliance, CFLs should only be used where lighting color and quality are not important.

 

Luckily, other lighting options exist to provide you, the consumer, with a better overall ‘green’ lighting experience… to save energy, the environment, and ultimately save money and time.

 

Light emitting diode, or LED, lights are one great option to consider instead of compact fluorescent bulbs.  In new construction or as a retrofit solution, LED lights do tend to cost more upfront, however, one LED ‘bulb’ may last as long as 50,000 hours: 50 times longer than that of an incandescent bulb and 5 times longer than that of a CFL.  Here are a few more facts in favor of LED lights:

 

·      LED lights contain NO TOXIC MERCURY

 

·      LED lights use less energy than other lamps on the market!  85% less energy spent per incandescent light and 50% less than a CFL

 

·      LED lights are dimmable AND produce a warmer light quality.  Everything looks more lifelike and the warm, pleasant ambiance desired when dimming is attainable.

 

·      Overall savings matter.  On average, one 65-watt light for 50,000 hours would cost around $325, but with one 12-watt LED light, it costs around $60.   Replacing the bulb less frequently saves resources, time, and money.

·      See for yourself!  Energy calculators help you see your savings over time: http://www.creells.com/calculator.aspx

As you can see, simply swapping out light bulbs for CFLs isn’t the only option available.  In many cases, it may not be the best answer at all.   With new fixtures becoming available – and prices dropping – consider LED lighting when trying to conserve energy in the home.  In the long run, it saves more energy, more money, is dimmable, and produces a pleasant light quality.  It’s win-win!

 

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES:

CFL disposal information:

·      Missouri Department of Natural Resources, Hazardous Waste Program:

o      1-800-361-4827

·      www.earth911.org

·      1-800-CLEAN-UP

LED lighting information:  http://www.creells.com/index.aspx

Home Lighting Control Alliance – www.homelightingcontrol.org

Learn more about Jamie at http://www.designspeakstl.com/team.htm

EarthDance Farm: Now Accepting "Freshman Farmies" for 2010

The crew at EarthDance Farms

Molly Rockamann was the subject of At Home's July-August End Note (she shared her 10 favorite local eco goods with us, including Irie Star's perfumes and Kakao chocolate). She was also profiled in St. Louis Magazine's 2009 green issue. What merited all this coverage? For the most part, it was EarthDance Farms, a working organic farm up in North County that's about more than just the produce. Molly likes to say they "put the culture back in agriculture," by "bringing the synergy of local activists, artists, business owners,  dancers, educators, event planners, farm apprentices, local residents, organization leaders, musicians, and youth together to create a fully sustaining community farm."

If you are curious about gardening and farming, and think you might want to apprentice to become a small-scale grower, you should check out EarthDance's "Freshman Farmie," program, which is now gearing up for the 2010 season. Here's the info, straight from Ms. Rockamann herself:

"In 2009 EarthDance inaugurated the part-time training program for 12 beginner farmers, and we're excited to announce that we'll be expanding the program for the 2010 growing season with 25 apprentices and almost double the acreage - to grow more local, organic food AND farmers for the St. Louis region. We've also hired experienced organic grower Vicki Lander to serve as the EarthDance farm manager!

The foundation of the program will remain the same:
1. Field work on the historic Mueller Farm in Ferguson
2. Selling produce at farmers markets
3. Enrichment sessions / workshops on various farming topics in-depth (from farm-scale composting to planning a farm business)
4. Field trips to local farms

An additional benefit for 2010 apprentices is that they'll become the initial members/shareholders of our pilot CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) program - receiving a hearty share of the produce we grow together each week of the harvest season.

Several of our 2009 'Freshman Farmies' will become 'Sophomore Farmies' in the program, building upon the knowledge they gained this year on the farm! (Others are going on to grow on their own, or with farming partners.)

At this year's Pesto Festo we were fortunate to raise enough scholarship funds to offer 3 scholarships to low-income individuals who could not otherwise afford to do the program. We are seeking current food pantry users to apply for the scholarships.

Applications can be found on our website, and are due December 15th, 2009. www.earthdancefarms.org."

So if you've read The Omnivore's Dilemma or seen Food, Inc., and literally want to get your hands dirty, here is your chance. Check out footage of the first crop of Freshman Farmies here, and if you are interested, EarthDance is encouraging folks to attend one of the two "So You Want to be a Farmer?" info sessions they've set up, the first at the Ferguson Library auditorium (35 N. Florissant) on December 8 at 7pm, and at the Schlafly Bottleworks Crown Room (7260 Southwest in Maplewood) at 7pm on December 9. --Stefene Russelll

The Omnivore's Cornicopia

On Tuesday night, the Webster Film Series screened Food, Inc. as the final installment of this year's Human Rights Film Series. The woman who introduced the film stated that the programmers left that movie for last -- prior screenings included King Korn, A Civil Action, Blue Gold: World Water Wars, and Manon of Spring -- because it's such a fantastic documentary, and the industrialization of our food supply is one of our most immediate and pressing concerns.

For me, realizing that most of the beef that ends up in fast-food burgers is washed with ammonia because processors just assume high levels of e. coli (a problem caused by overcrowding cattle, as well as feeding them corn, which they cannot digest), convinced me that yes, this is an emergency. What compensated for sufferng through dry heaves -- and wet eyes -- during the factory farm and slaughterhouse sequences was footage of renegade farmer Joel Salatin of Polyface Farm. According to Salatin, a cow will shed most of the e.coli in its gut in a week or so once you put it back out to pasture and allow it to eat grass. So why are we pumping cattlle full of antibiotics, which only serves to breed resistant strains of e. coli? Why are we still feeding them corn? Sure, corn is cheap; but I can't imagine that grass isn't! The answer is that all of these practices are subsidized, the result of lobbying by the processed food industry. Michael Pollan and Eric Schlosser, who also appear in the film, make that point repeatedly. And that we can change that by supporting small, family farms like Salatin's, growing our own gardens, and being as conscious as possible about what we buy and stick in our mouths.

Though Food, Inc. screened one night only (it caused a lot of controversy when it opened in St. Louis, thanks to a critical chapter on Monsanto, so perhaps the run was cut short?), the good news is that Salatin will be here Monday October 5 to deliver a lecture, titled "Ballet in the Pasture," at Webster's Grand Gynmasium (if you can't go, check out Jean Ponzi's recent interview with Salatin on KDHX's Earthworms.) Interestingly enough, St. Louis seems to be the point of constellation for this issue right now, perhaps because we are hosting Farm Aid this Sunday at the Verizon Ampitheater. Related to that event: the Farm Meets Fork Farm Aid benefit October 2, the Farmer Cook-Off at Taste of St. Louis and HOMEGROWN Urban Country Fair at the Tower Grove Famer's Market October 3.

As for the future of industrial iceberg lettuce -- I'd like to echo the sentiments expressed in  this edition of Ben Katchor's Hotel & Farm. --Stefene Russell

Affordable Soil Tests; Cold Frames = 12-month Gardening

Soil profile courtesy of soils.usda.gov

Any master gardener will tell you: test your soil before you plant! Until you know what nutrients (or eek - heavy metals) are lurking in your dirt, it's a waste of money to invest in starts, or even seeds. In germ-phobic societies like ours, we forget that dirt (well, actually I should say soil) is not something to be scrubbed off the surface of the earth but a living ecosystem; a teaspoon of healthy soil contains (cue Carl Sagan voice) billions of organisms. But until we discover how to create a human-nemotode psychic uplink, the only way of knowing what (or who?) is in your dirt is a soil test. Soil tests can be a little pricey, and the process of collecting soil samples is straightforward but a little inconvenient. We can't fix the latter, but the former is less of a problem than you might think; the wonderful Homegrown Evolution reports that UMASS offers soil tests for under $10. Though you can get a free PH test from the Kemper Center for Home Gardening or Missouri Ag, that won't tell you anything about what nutrients are present and accounted for or what you need to remediate. Things change from year to year as well, depending on how well you mulch and compost, and what you plant in the ground. As Homegrown Evolution says, longstanding gardeners get into the routine of "test the soil, amend according to the recommendations and grow. Lather, rinse, repeat."

Another great tip from Homegrown Evolution: Franchi Seeds. Looking at the lovely greens they offer makes me want to set up a forty-foot-long raised bed just for lettuces. In fact, their pretty greens are the reason why I may be trottin' down to Home Depot (and the ReStore) this weekend to get supplies for cold frames, so that we can have fresh greens in the dead of winter. Cold Frames are as easy to build as a raised bed (well, unless you decide to go the expensive but even simpler route and buy a prefab raised bed frame!). See below for a quick video primer on building your own cold frames. --Stefene Russell

A Platinum Pursuit

Jetson Green, the lively (and international) sustainable-building blog, has a new post up called "St. Louis High School Seeking Leed Platinum."  So which school? Crossroads. For all the details, including which building the school's building, what materials they're reusing, and how they've involved students in the process, click through to the post, and onto a page at the school's site, which includes virtual tours and additional press the project's gotten. -- Stephen Schenkenberg  

More Affordable (but Beautiful) Green Building: Texas' King of Salvage

The New York Times gets a whole box of gold gummed stars for this excellent piece on Dan Phillips, a Texas builder who works exclusively with salvaged materials. (Be sure to look at the slide show.) I love this quote:

"Freed by necessity from what he calls the 'tyranny of the two-by-four and four-by-eight,' common sizes for studs and sheets of plywood, respectively, Mr. Phillips makes use of end cuts discarded by other builders — he nails them together into sturdy and visually interesting grids. He also makes use of mismatched bricks, shards of ceramic tiles, shattered mirrors, bottle butts, wine corks, old DVDs and even bones from nearby cattle yards."

Phillips, who's given his company the wonderful name of "Phoenix Commotion," has set up a drop site for builders, where they can get rid of excess materials without a dump fee, but can also write off the materials on their taxes as a donation. St. Louis has a few programs that are similar, including the Habitat for Humanity ReStore, but it would be great to see an even larger effort afoot to divert usable materials from the landfills.

The other thing I love about Phoenix Commotion is its commitment to building high-quality, sustainable low-income housing, using a simliar philosophy as Habitat for Humanity (the homeowner helps bulld the house). Though unfortunately some of Mr. Phillips' first clients have had their homes go into foreclosure, other homeowners are experiencing a substantial increase in their quality of life:

"One of his houses belongs to Gloria Rivera, a cashier at a doughnut shop, who built the home with Mr. Phillips and her teenage son in 2004. Before then, she lived in a rented mobile home. Constructed almost entirely out of salvaged and donated materials, the 600-square-foot wooden house is painted royal blue with various squares of red, maroon and fuchsia tile glued to the mismatched gingerbread trim.

Inside, there is imported Tuscan marble on the floor, though the tiles are not of uniform size, and bright yellow stucco walls that Ms. Rivera said she textured using her thumb. 'It’s not perfect but it’s mine,” Ms. Rivera said, touching the stucco, which looks like very thick and very messy butter cream frosting. “I call it my doll house.'"

To my eyes, this looks like organic architecture for the 21st century. --Stefene Russell

The New Terrarium

VivaTerra's recycled glass terrariums.

This summer, we got a little dose of 1970s nostalgia with the return of the maxidress. Now there's another 70s staple popping up everywhere: the Terrarium. Llike many trends, this one's better the second time around; the 21st century terrarium is tabletop-sized (rather than three feet tall, or meant to be a conversation starter in a conversation pit) and made of glass, rather than translucent plastic, which quickly gets scratched and dirty-looking. In fact, the new terrariums are probably far closer to the ones cultivated in Victorian conservatories, rather than Earth Day in a bottle.  If you're handy, you can make your own, or shops like Anthropologie offer stylish ready-made ones. Just be sure to leave some room in there for your pet rock, since that trend'll inevitably see a renaissance too. --Stefene Russell

A $3,000 Green House

Twenty-four-year-old Ziggy, a resident of Missouri's own Dancing Rabbit EcoVillage, was featured this month on TreeHugger, where they list the materials and dissect the process that went into constructing his $3,000 cob house. While not everyone is going to want to live in a mud house, it does suggest that there are less pricey ways to build green; the Habitat for Humanity houses featured in our July/Aug issue, for instance, are extremely affordable ... and LEED Platinum. As "green," transitions from trendy to mainstream -- and becomes less of a gold rush for marketers and sharks in sharkskin suits -- hopefully we'll begin to see homebuilding adopting green practices acrosst the board, and making it available to everyone. --Stefene Russell

Reburbia

Been keeping an eye on the Dwell/Inhabitat "Reburbia" contest, specifically the projects that include lots of sprouting things; of course, if the suburbs are going to lower their energy consuption, growing  food onsite is an easy way to do that, so a lot of these projects do include sprouting things, and not in the form of lawns and/or hostas, as sweet as, er, hostas can be. One standout to me is Brian Alessi's Regenerative Suburban Median. It's not as cool-looking as the Airbias, but it's tiny and feasible, and I see great beauty in that. Of course, ideally one would plant stuff in subdivision medians right now while continuing to scan the horizion for suburban airships. What was that old Casey Kasem used to say about keeping your on the ground, but keep reaching for the stars? Right on. --Stefene Russell

EcoUrban, Back on the Radar

It was great to see EcoUrban pop back on the radar yesterday, with a post to the UrbanSTL forums: 

Undeterred by the worst housing market since, well, people lived in caves, EcoUrban has worked with local architects E + U to develop some boss new 1-story models and is hereby subjecting them to your (fine Urban STLers) unflinching gaze. 

Continue reading the post for details on the new models, including the above. (For more on EcoUrban's Jay Swoboda, consult your September-October 2007 issue of AT HOME, and these two pieces published in SLM.) -- Stephen Schenkenberg