The united states energy policy act of 2005 makes it possible for Builders or Owner/builders to qualify for a one time $2,000 tax credit for a new energy-efficient homes. At least a fifth of the energy savings must come from building envelopment improvements such as ICF's.

In the United States we spend $37 billion each year on electricity for lighting, yet only $3.7 billion (1/10) of that pays for actual light. For incandescent bulbs, 90% of the electricity gets dissipated wastefully as heat.

In 2005 Americans built about 1.5 million new homes. Despite rising energy costs, less than 1% of these new structures featured any type of renewable energy source such as solar, geothermal, or wind energy.

Percent of U.S. electricity consumption used to run air conditioners: 18%

Combined open space in the average home that is created by gaps, cracks, and holes in wood stud construction: equivalent of a 4' x 4' open window.

Annual amount of money the average American family spent 5 years ago on gasoline, home heating, and electricity: $3,300; amount of money the average family will spend in 2006: $5,100

Distance California tomatoes sold in Washington, DC, have traveled: 2,800 miles; amount of CO2 produced by the transport truck to get them there: 165,000 pounds

In a typical wood stud wall nearly 14% of the wall area is taken up by wood studs with an R value of around 4.38. While Energy Code requires R13 wall insulation. It does not require R-13 wall performance. Batt insulation is virtually never installed with care.

About 226,000 concrete homes were built in the United States or roughly 16% of total home production.

SOLAR - an abundant clean energy source difficult to justify in spite of rebates:

1. One Kilowatt (kW) equals 1,000 watts.

2. A 1-kW solar system is about 120 square feet of solar panels.

3. A 1-kW system is expected to cost between $6,000 and $10,000 not including any rebates you may receive from the city of Austin.

4. A 1-kW solar system should produce between 1,000 - 1,400 kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electricity annually. This represents $70 - $120 worth of electricity annually.

5. The average residential home in Austin uses about 12,000 kWh of electricity annually. So a 1-kW system would provide about 1/12th of the electricity needed by the average home.

6. Austin Energy offers on of the highest rebates in the country at $4000 per kW. This is capped at $12,000 or 80% of the invoiced cost which ever is less.

7. Best Case Payback: A 3-kW system which would supply about 25% of the electricity needed by most homes after rebates could run as little as 3 x ($6,000 - $4,000 rebate) = $6,000. If that 3-kW system resulted in the max savings / year of $360. It would take 16.6 years to pay back.

8. Worst Case Payback: If each kW of a 3-kW system cost $10,000 before rebate, since the rebate is capped at $12,000. The system would cost the home owner $18,000. If it produced the minimum amount of energy each year for a saving of $210 / year annual savings, it would pay back in 85 years.

9. Solar panels are typically warranted for 20 - 25 years.

America continues to import a higher and higher percent of its oil requirements.

New tax credits make green building more affordable. The new Energy Policy Act of 2005 provides tax incentives for builders, remodelers, and homeowners.

1. Homeowners can write off 30% of the cost for installing photovoltaic systems up to a $2,000 maximum tax credit.

2. Homeowners can write off 10% of the cost for creating energy-efficient building envelopes up to a $500 maximum which applies to insulation, upgraded thermostats, metal roofs, etc.

3. Builders and contractors who build qualifying energy-efficient residences can write off up to $2,000 per home.

4. Homeowners can get up to a $200 lifetime credit for newly installed energy-efficient windows or energy efficient home appliances and a $300 lifetime credit for qualifying energy-efficient heat pumps, air conditioners, and water heaters.

Vegetative roofs sometimes called "living roofs" offer an excellent way to keep a home cool and can also be used to reduce the heat island effect in urban environments. A roofing system comprised of Lite-Deck structural insulated concrete roofing with a layer of Protecto Wrap waterproofing on top of it, then covered by a drainage system such as the Atlantis drain can provide the first key elements of a vegetative roof. Water that does run off the roof can be collected in a modular Atlantis rain water retention grid and pumped onto lawns for later use.

Austin is in a hot/humid climate zone. Most of our HVAC load is cooling. A properly sized HVAC unit is key to energy efficiency but there is a lot more than just that required for your HVAC to work properly. Most HVAC units are oversized which means that they short cycle and don't stay on long enough to dehumidify properly. The optimum relative humidity range inside a home should be maintained between 35% and 50%. Proper installation of ducting is very important. In the average home, 30% of the air flowing through the duct work is lost into the attic and 99% of the attics in Texas are vented. What this means is that 30% of your conditioned air escapes through your attic to the outdoors. You can increase the efficiency of your HVAC unit but there may be little change to your energy bill if the duct work is leaky. The first and most obvious solution to this problem is to make sure the ducting is properly installed and sealed at all the plenums with mastic. Another good idea is to place the HVAC ducting and blower inside conditioned air space. The easiest way to achieve this is to spray in foam insulation into the rafters of your attic and seal it. By eliminating the ridge vents and soffit vents and blowing in foam insulation onto the underside of the roof you are creating a sealed attic. Any leaks which might occur in the ducting doesn't escape your home and actually helps to cool down the attic. If you are trying to blow 55 degree F air through your duct work and that duct work runs through an attic space that is 140 degrees F the heat gain is much higher that if your trying to do the same thing but the attic is only 110 degrees F. That is what a foam sealed attic does for you.

Consider building smaller better built homes. Its a fact that most residences over 4,000 square feet have an average occupancy period of two to three years less than the average-sized (2,500 sf) home. Bigger is clearly not better. Cavernous homes can be unfriendly habitats.

Orient the home properly if possible with attention to solar angles and prevailing breezes and natural shade. This can do a lot to save on energy bills.

Detach the garage. Connected garages can introduce unhealthy fumes from cars and chemicals into the home through the heat and air pressure differentials which occur between conditioned and unconditioned spaces.

Incorporate large overhangs. This helps in a number of ways in Austin. Large overhangs keep moisture off the external house walls and reduces the chances of water related problems such as black mold. In summertime when its hot, large overhangs also help block the sun that might come in through windows in the summer time when the angle of the sun tends to be more directly over head. In the winter the angle of the sun in Austin is lower in the sky so more of the light and radiant heat from the light can enter the home to help heat the inter space.

A brief lesson in thermodynamics: Thermal energy flows by 3 distinct mechanisms. Because our problem in Austin is hot summers predominantly, we should focus on heat gain inside our structures rather than heat loss because we have very little winter to worry about here.

1. Convection is the first mechanism by which heat enters a home. Air currents that enter through doors and windows and roof and walls bring in heat energy with them. A leaky house effectively has no insulation - because it doesn't matter what the R value is of your walls, roof, or windows & doors if outside air is entering unintentionally. In the average wood frame home, the entire volume of air inside that home is completely replaced by outside air every 2 hours. The only way to efficiently control an interior environment is to first contain it.

2. Radiance is the second mechanism that brings in heat energy. Glass allows the sun to shine into your home. One of the components of sunlight is infrared energy or heat. You've heard of the green house effect. During a hot day go to a window and touch a portion of your carpet being hit by direct sunlight. It will be warmer than a shaded area. This is heat gain into your home through radiance. It has nothing to do with convection currents or the next mechanism to be discusses.

3. Conduction is 3rd mechanism by which heat energy can enter a home. It is distinctly different from either convection or radiance. Heat flows from higher temperatures to lower temperatures. Even with walls where there are no windows (no radiance) and where the wall is constructed in an air tight way (eliminating any convection currents), if the outside air is 100 degrees F and your thermostat is set to 70 degrees F, heat will flow from the outside to the inside of your home. From an energy efficiency standpoint the issue minimizing the rate at which that energy flows. The rate at which heat energy is "conducted" into your home is determined by two factors - the temperature differential between the outside air and the inside air, and the thermal resistance of the barrier separating the two. The thermal resistance is referred to as R value. In the simplest terms: Conduction heat gain = Temperature Differential / R value. You can see that if you increase the R value, you decrease the component of heat gain due to conduction.

In Austin stress SHGC or solar heat gain coefficient for glazing (door and window glass) to lower as much as possible the transference of heat energy into the home through the radiance effect.  A SHGC of .4 is a minimum target. .35 is even better. A SHGC of .35 means that only 35% of the radiant heat from the sun is allowed to pass through the glass into the home. From a heat conduction standpoint windows are not good insulators. Some of the best windows only have a thermal conductance (i.e. U value) of .3. The reciprocal of U value is R value. So 1 / .3 = 3.33 R. That means the R value for even a very good window is only 3.33. Not much. The point is that windows do a very poor job of blocking conductive heat flow. This is often where architecture and energy efficiency butt heads because people like windows and lots of them.

Front loading washers and dryers are a good idea. Traditional top loading washers and dryers do not seal well. A lot of heat energy escapes through the top of traditional washers in the form of water vapor which introduces new heat and humidity into our interior living spaces. There are many manufacturers of Energy Star approved washers and dryers.

Specify solid surface flooring. Hard surface floors such as wood, tile, natural linoleum, and stained concrete floors are much easier to keep clean than the sponge-like surfaces of wall-to-wall carpet, which can not only contain harmful chemicals within their materials but can harbor mold spores and other allergens. Area rugs can be used to add softer surfaces when desired, and they can be easily removed for cleaning.

The amount of coal that does not have to be burned due to energy savings achieved by a single compact fluorescent light bulb: 500 pounds. Lifetime energy cost savings of using that bulb: $67. Pounds of carbon dioxide not released into the atmosphere: 1,000 pounds.

Air pollution avoided when only ten 100 watt light bulbs are powered for one hour by wind instead of coal: The equivalent pollution created by a car driving 2,400 miles - the distance from New York City to Boise, Idaho.

Percent of U>S. electricity consumption that could be provided each year by harvesting just the wind in North Dakota: 33%

Percent by which the living space of U.S. homes exceeds the living space of homes in Europe or Japan: 200%. For Africa: 2,600%.

Number of hours it takes the sunlight falling on the earth to provide the amount of energy the entire world consumes in one year: 1 hour.

Number of feet below the surface of the earth where a year-round constant average temperature of between 50º F and 55º F is maintained: 6 feet.

Amount of waste U.S. builders generate each year: 31.5 million tons at a cost of $32 / ton in 2005 to dispose of this waste.

Total waste produced from an average stick built 2,000 square foot home: 50 cubic yards or 4 tons.

Percent of Arizona that would have to be covered with photovoltaic collectors to provide the world's entire energy needs: 20%

Annual U.S. drywall production: 15 million tons. Amount of new drywall that ends up in the trash each year: 2.25 million tons. Roughly 15%.

Effective January 23, 2006 HVAC units must comply to the National Appliance Energy Conservation Act setting federal guidelines. HVAC units may now only be manufactured with a minimum SEER rating of 13.

Strong lobbying by the fiberglass industry keeps R value as the only consideration in wall and attic insulation. Wall performance which would take air infiltration into account would be a much better measure of true wall thermal performance.

The typical code inspector in the City of Austin is given about 10 minutes to inspect a home each time they come out. If you are buying a spec home and you removed the drywall, you would be shocked at they quality of the batt installation in most homes.

The sheetrock installer will not repair this. It will simply be covered over.

Annual amount of carbon dioxide the average American produces: 22 tons, 6 times the global average.

Approximate global production of carbon dioxide, annually: 20 billion tons; percent of this carbon dioxide that can be naturally absorbed by the earth: 50%

We build most of our homes with wood. Check this statistic out. Percent of callbacks and defect litigation that is a result of moisture related problems in residential construction: 80%

Percent by which electricity use will decrease when room lighting is dimmed by half: 40%; percent by which this extends the life of a bulb: 2,000%

Average weight of drywall dumped daily into landfills around the globe: 40,000 tons; percent that could be recycled: 100%

Oil Prices / barrel over the years:
DATE         VALUE
1946-01-01   1.170
1956-01-01   2.820
1966-01-01   2.920
1976-01-01  11.160
1986-01-01  22.945
1996-01-01  18.880
2006-01-01  65.510
2006-02-01  61.630
2006-03-01  62.900
2006-07-07  peaked at 75.780
2007-11-01  peaked at 96.240
2016                 ?