Lecture Series/ Krune Building
Last Thursday I began attending a lecture series at Yale in the School of Forrestry and Environmental Science. It was strange, returning to where I spent four years of my life over twenty-five years ago. Funny thing about it is, when I was an undergraduate, I never stepped foot in that building, or for that matter did I venture into that part of the university altogether. Science hill is the area of the university where the math, science folks went, and I was an artsy, writing guy.So we drove up to Science Hill, got out of the car and headed into the F&ES building. Harassed only one person for directions, and we entered Bowers Auditorium, where, oddly enough, it reminded me of being in a lecture hall in college. The only differences were 1) there were refreshments in the back, and 2) after grabbing a cup of coffee, I sat towards the front because I was actually interested in being there. The lecturer was Gus Speth, the Dean of the F&ES. His introducer went through the many incredible things Speth has done in his career, then ta-da, Speth stepped up to the podium, and to be totally honest about it, gave a pretty mediocre lecture. Not to say he's a bad lecturer, but the topic was pretty dull. It was about the multiple administrative difficulties he faced over the previous 5 years getting the University to capitulate to the building of the new Krune building, and on the gloriousness of the plan for the building.I learned a lot about the resistance to new ideas during the lecture even within a supposed bastion for new ideas. Speth seemingly engaged in the academic form of open warfare with the temporary provost of the University for a multi-year stretch. After finally outlasting the temp, he actually got what he wanted, which was to have the university agree to get rid of the Pierson-Sage power plant, virtually an energy dinosaur, which of course, sat adjacent to where the Krune building is to be built. Throughout the lecture there were several references to the environmentally ground-breaking nature of the building and how those element will provide leadership for the rest of the university and the community at large to move toward a "greener" future. And I sat there and thought about it for a long time, and I realized this is exactly what is wrong with universities and right with them at the same time.Let's tackle what's right first. The Krune building is a brilliant building. Brilliant design, brilliant lighting, floor plan, usage of renewable energy sources. All that good stuff. Further, it is in some respects a beacon, a lighthouse offering direction through the fog of grants and red tape and construction costs and varying reports on the virtues of different forms of fuels and energy and passive solar design and fuel cells... on and on and on. Further, in one sense it cost the university nothing. Yale told Speth, "Go ahead, but you have to raise the money," and Speth did, got costs broken down, got estimates, hired architects, designers, construction teams, and tallied it all up and then went out to find private donations. Got donations, and hence, the name "Krune." (I guess that is better than say the Southwest Airlines Arena, but not much.) Further, went after the power plant, fought the good fight, threatened "the power plant or me!" The power plant had to go. Well done.But let us talk about leadership for a moment. What does it mean to be a leader? I wonder about that because for the first time, I saw my alma mater as the ivory tower I am sure it always was, but I guess I was too self-absorbed or inebriated to know it. As I look at the design for the Krune building, I realize that it is unrealistic for anybody but a Yale, or Harvard, or University of Texas, or the Brookings Institute, or Bill Gates to consider building a building like the Krune building. The cost per square foot must be nearly a thousand dollars, whereas I am a principal in a company that aspires to create green homes for under a hundred dollars a square foot. Now, if you are playing follow the leader, yeh, the Harvard might follow the Oberlin who might follow the Brown who might follow the Sacremento Museum of Fine Art (I'm just pulling these names off the top of my head and they have no correlation to reality other than I know these places exist.) But when you are talking about global warming, what you are shooting for is the entire human population, particularly virulent polluters like the US, to change its behavior. Walking around in a library that uses solar energy is not going to make you wander home and cry out to the misses, "Hey, honey, we need to throw some solar panels on top of this sucker." But I think if someone is buiding a new house and you, as a builder say, "Hey, you know what? I can build your house pretty cheap and still do your electric system solar, cut your bills way down near nothing, and it will be just the house you want. Cost you less than Joe Blow was going to charge." Now that will get people changing. Cheaper, better, greener? I am not saying Yale is not doing a good thing by building the ultimate green building. But who is going to follow? The question is already out there: how do we face the impending global warming crisis? Al Gore got it out there, and I'm sorry to say, he went to Harvard. But the point is, Yale, we know already. Green is good. Now how do we bring everybody to the table? Making a spaceship modern building, cool and all, but 7, 8, 9 hundred dollars a square foot just is not dealing with the real world.

Environmental Equality for Everyday People
The beginning germ for this book began when I was in the seventh grade and Duncan Phillips was on top of me. I know that sounds strange, but I was required to go out for some sport in the winter season, and I chose wrestling. My brother James, who is a year older than I am, wrestled, and I figured I would do what he did. That was how I chose most things early on in life. As it turns out, I sucked at wrestling. Also, as it turns out, Duncan Phillips did not. So one week into the winter sports season in 1972, I lay on my back struggling and Duncan Phillips was on top of me pinning my sorry ass to the mat. The wrestling coach's hand slapped against the mat, indicating I was toast, and that was the moment I decided I needed another sport.The next day, I asked if I could switch to basketball, and that was when I discovered an entirely new world. I grew up in Washington, DC, which during the early 1970's, was the most predominantly Black city in the country. In his African-American call to acknowledgement, "I'm Black and I'm Proud," James Brown referred to Washington as "Chocolate City." Since, DC has undergone significant social and racial changes, and I believe Detroit has supplanted Washington as the most heavily Black dominated city in the US, but back then we were "Chocolate City." This is important, because once I began playing basketball, I found my true sports love. However, to fall in love with a sport is to commit one's self to practice. And while we had a nice sized house in the Georgetown section of intown Washington, we sure as shooting didn't have a basketball court. The nearest court available was an asphalt slab ten blocks away: Volta Park. My first time there I saw Black and White men, mostly Black, I'd say seventy-thirty, playing basketball. Every spare hour of every temperate weekend day from sun up to sun down from that day forth until I went to college, that was where I was. If you go to Volta and 33rd even today, you will see folks playing ball. It is a very nice city park, with a baseball field, a public swimming pool, tennis courts, and a small field house where during the week small children gather for day care. But to me, at the age of twelve, it was the hoops courts and nothing else. There I really learned how to play basketball. It was, more importantly, where I was introduced to Black America, prejudice with a human face, and my first inklings that America wasn't the land of equality my powers that be wanted me to believe. My realization of injustice had names and faces to go with the stories: Briscoe, Cap, Black Earl, Downtown, Ced, and Crazy Bronx, to name those I can still remember from thirty-five years ago. These were men, mostly in their twenties and thirties, African-American, who experienced racism everyday in every way. I was the rich White kid that sat and listened and returned home to my stately residence and my tie and jacket private school with a sense of all is not right in this world. That feeling never left. It is now thirty-five years later, 2007, and I have another passion, the environment and the global warming crisis. I, like many others, am a recent convert. I saw "An Inconvenient Truth" and realized I had to do something. I already was involved in commercial real estate. Most of my work took place in destitute urban settings in Connecticut-- cities like Bridgeport, New Haven, Waterbury and Hartford. However, within the last two years I started seeing shops and advertisements sprouting up in the tonier spots along Connecticut's Gold Coast (meaning: Greenwich, New Canaan, Darien, Norwalk, Westport, Weston, Wilton, Fairfield-- Manhattan commuter communities with enormous McMansions gently nestled into two acre lots) touting "Green Remodeling!" As it turns out, a friend of mine was one of the leading contractors in this green remodeling movement and his business was booming. "You can't believe how many of these rich Greenwich housewives want their houses totally redone completely green. I love Al Gore. He's making me rich."OK, so rich housewives are going green, and doing a fine job of carbon offsetting their SUVs and Hummers. Gerald Moore and James Smith, two African-American friends, both extremely bright men with post-graduate degrees but without the high-paying jobs to match, live in the area of Bridgeport where the proportedly the Mafia dumps much of its toxic waste and "green" construction is not even a blip on the radar screen, what with crime, poverty, police brutality, and missing social services to contend with first. What is wrong with this picture?However, this disproportion of justice doesn't negate the fact: the "green" explosion is for real. If you examine the numbers, there is no question that even in the most negative real estate market in decades, "green" construction is going great guns, with industry growth in the neighborhood of twenty percent. Something of a disconnect is going on here. The housing market is in shambles. The economy is headed into recession. The environment is the hottest topic in the media. The "green" economy is going through the roof. My unjustice hackles are up. I'm afraid of the world cooking to a light crisp and the rich being the only ones with sunscreen and an umbrella. So, my partner, Steve Schappert, and I have decided to actually do something about it. We are trying to start a company that makes housing which is cheaper than traditionally built housing, but which utilizes solar power and energy efficiency, thereby creating what we call Bios Homes or Zero+ Energy homes. Steve, who has always had a thing for environmental issues since his best friend's dad gave him rides to soccer practice in the first home made fuel cell powered car in the seventies, is a visionary of sorts with all the baggage that comes with being a visionary. Visionaries rarely have that little something I like to call perspective. Instead, they see a single goal and head in that direction, the wind, weather, and whatever be damned. Great to have as a partner though. Let's you know in which direction your compass is pointed at all times. Point is we're in the process of creating housing which is about 17% cheaper to build than traditional construction but which is energy efficient and utilizes solar power photo voltaic cells. There are two basic benefits to this idea, both of which are big. The first is that while the wealthy have bigger housing than the non-wealthy in the US, its not 50 times bigger. So while Buffy and Reginald Davenport III may be going green, that leaves about 95% of US housing that is the same old crapola which eats energy like crazy. If we build regular houses which are green as can be, that don't eat energy like crazy for the average Joe, then this green idea is no longer the plaything of the rich, but a possibility for everybody. Throw in the fact it will be cheaper and less costly to maintain with the diminished energy costs, well, you're talking a home run. Heck, people can help the environment and save money. Most people are simply going to ask where they can sign up. The global warming crisis is not changing until the greening of American and the rest of the globe takes place in all construction, not just a small sliver of construction. Second, our plan is one of the few plans that is designed to make its designers wads of money while being good for everyone. This is key and yet it could come across as only self-serving, which it is, but is not as well. If a company like ours produces housing which is cheaper and lessens the carbon footprint of the average American home dweller and the idea goes over really well, we will be really rich. I know that sounds disgusting, but stick with me for a moment. If every builder out there saw us making gobs of money doing it greener and cheaper, that is the only way they are going to change what they've been doing up until now. You can't change the way people do business by making them feel guilty. If that were the case, Exxon would have closed shop 30 years ago. GE would have committed suicide en masse if guilt were a business motivating factor. Does not work like that. Business is about making money. Make more money, better business. Simple. Now, we believe we have a way to make GREED, that big bad monster, not only run the economy, but this time save the planet.Change happens only when one must change, or the incentive to change is so great, you would have to be a fool not to change. Admittedly, there are fools in every walk of life and construction is not immune to this, but I believe most people, when presented with the obvious in a clear, logical, and realistic manner, will adopt the obvious as a new fact of life. Despite the present Presidential administrations attempts to convince us otherwise, the vast majority of Americans now realize we have a global warming crisis. Al Gore has presented the obvious in a clear, logical, and realistic manner, and most people get it. What has not been presented to the public is: how do you do anything about it on an individual basis that won't bankrupt you? That's what this blog book is about. I will attempt to show you what is out there for the "everyday people" to go green and with meaning. I will also show you how many forces out there don't want you to go green, because it means money will be taken out of their pockets. Right now, one of those guys in your president, and that is a very big problem. But we'll tackle that political mess a little later. There is a lot to cover, and I will attempt to do it topic by topic, but let it be known, that despite its reputation as being a pointless decade, the ideas for this blog book came from those very same 1970's.Hey, make fun of disco all you want, but some interesting things happened back then that changed all of our lives for the better. The purpose of this book then, is to take those things learned from the seventies and turn them into something meaningful for everyone. The title of this blog, and what I hope will be a book on the net from blogs, Environmental Justice for Everyday People, is about the merging of two ideas: saving the planet by going to green construction, and combining it with reasonably priced housing stock, so some of Sly and the Family Stone's "Everyday People" can sit under the green revolution umbrella and catch some shade too.

Green Lists or the Price of Environmental Hip Status
vRenovated spaces vRight-sized space DesignvGreen IntelligentvHealthy non toxic natural materials Energy Star Appliances)vEfficiency (Energy vDay-light spacesWater efficient showers heads, sinks)vfixtures (Toilets,vQuality Construction Recycled vmaterials & salvaged items from older homes vLocal Materials and landscaping utilizing local plantsvOrganic land careSouthern vorientation of the house Limited or no use of plastics (especially vPVC) asphaltvLimited or no use ofPleasing spaces gracefully integrated vwith natureWe are in process of building an online directory of Green Products. Please check back as we bring you links to the following categories of products and services.1. Alternative Building Materials 2. Architectural a. Residential b. Small Commercial c. Large Commercial, Government & Institutional 3. Building Contractorsa. Residential b. Small Commercial c. Large Commercial, Government & Institutional4. Building Control Systems 5. Building Maintenance 6. Cleaning Products 7. Commissioning 8. Consulting9. Connecticut Produced Products 10. Day Lighting11. Design Services a. Residential b. Small Commercial c. Large Commercial, Government & Institutional 12. Educational 13. Electricians 14. Energy Audit Services 15. Energy Efficiency16. Energy Efficient Products 17. Energy Modeling 18. Engineering Services a. Residential b. Small Commercial c. Large Commercial, Government & Institutional 19. Environmental Remediation 20. Financial Services 21. Flooring 22. Furniture 23. Governmental 24. Green Electricity25. Green Retailers26. Healthy Products 27. Home Inspections 28. Indoor Air Quality29. HVAC30. Interior Design 31. Insulation 32. Land Use33. Landscape Architecture 34. Landscape Design/Construction 35. Landscape Plants & Materials 36. Legal 37. LEED™ Accreditation/Consulting 38. Lighting Design 39. Lighting Products 40. Lumber 41. Natural Gas 42. Not-for-Profit 43. Office Equipment 44. Organic Land Care45. Organic Products 46. Paints & Coatings 47. Plumbers 48. Real Estate Services 49. Recycling & Waste Management 50. Recycled Materials & Products 51. Renewable Energy 52. Remodeling 53. Research 54. Retailers 55. Roofing Materials56. Site Planning 57. Solid Waste 58. Solar 59. Transportation 60. Wall Coverings 61. Wastewater 62. Water Heating 63. Water Management 64. Water Conservation 65. Wind 66. Windows67. Wood Products I put this list together off of the Connecticut Green Building Association site. These elements were all listed as being key to building green. So, I would love folks to chime in, item by item, as to what they think it would cost EXTRA (above and beyond normal construction costs without a "green" agenda} per square foot, say to add these elements properly. There are, of course, multiple elements within elements, and I am sure there are folks out there who know exactly what all of the water management costs of going green are, but haven't a clue about environmentally friendly flooring. That's fine. Just chime in on what it is you do know. That would be extremely helpful.I realize I have set this up like I have a bet on it. "Hey, Bud, I think it will cost only x dollars/ square foot to go whole hog green." "No, f'in' way! It'll cost twice that if a penny." "Wanna bet?"No, that isn't the impetus for this, but it sure as shootin' could be. Just navigating through the particutlars about a topic I blogged earlier about Green being the province of the spoiled rich when it should be directed toward the affordable housing set instead. Anyway, let's see what we come up with and go from there.

Avalence II
After I met with Tom, the Chief Technical Officer, I went to see Debbie Moss and Steve Nagy, the principals in Avalence. Actually, Debbie came to find me, because Tom and I had been talking for an hour and forty-five minutes and folks were wondering what exactly happened to us for so long. We were back in the lunch room sitting down, both of us with pads of paper madly scribbling down figures to calculate the energy benefits for us, BIOs Building Tech. Actually, the benefits are rather limited. But, after talking with Steve and Debbie about the nature of technological development, we at BIOs are still going to get one installed in our lobby.The questions is: why?The answer is not, believe it or not, to show what innovative thinkers BIOS leaders are. Instead, it is the planting of a seed. One of the most significant acts we can accomplish as a company is to show the public what is possible. If we somehow can influence one or two folks to use a Hydrofiller for their own use, more funds will flow toward Avalence, either in the form of outright sales or development funds from private investors or governmental programs. Eventually, Avalence will develop something not in the Beta stage. Eventually, they will make a machine that turns water into fuel and fits in your basement and runs your house's entire energy needs from a fuel cell.One might wonder why this machine then must sit in our show room. Good question. But I think we suffer from a syndrome called "the Jetsons syndrome." I just made that up, but it helps illustrate what I mean. The Jetsons syndrome is the popular belief that if we can imagine a new technology and someone can make a new technology, (household robots, for instance) then, poof, it will appear on our doorstep in ten years. Unfortunately, life and technology do not work like that. The missing ingredient in that equation is MONEY! Unless, Avalence gets sufficiently funded, they will no longer develop Hydrofillers. If they don't develop more Hydrofillers, and ones that are more efficient than the ones they have already developed, gas stations won't install Hydrofillers, because they will be too expensive. With no place to refuel, no one in their right mind would buy a hydrogen car, would they? (As an aside, in CA there are a nested bunch of hydrogen filling stations, and, guess what, more hydrogen cars are bought and sold in CA than anywhere else in the US.)The point is public opinion about a technology makes or breaks a technology. Do you remember thirty five years ago, when computers were these huge boxes that spit out reams upon reams of paper will holes punched out? No one in their right mind would want one of those things in their house. It would be stupid, expensive, messy, and pointless. Today, almost everybody reading this has a home computer. Computers are now reasonably priced and an integral part of our culture. But back then, computer companies, such as IBM and Mac received funds and support from vague and mysterious sources, and it wasn't until many years down the line that they started to make money and Bill Gates became a household name.However, between the time that those paper dots were all over the computer lab floor and now, someone had to say to someone else, "Check this out! We have this amazing machine that can take this data I'm punching in here," click, click, click, "and then it computes it all by itself and puts it out the answer over there. Just think, eventually every household will have one of these things!" I admit, I was one of those guys that looked at the computer geeky enthusiast and longed for the less intrusive slide rule version of geekdom. Time has shown me the error of my thinking.So, the answer to the question above, "Why?," seems a lot clearer to me now. Someone has to be the geek enthusiast. Someone has to jump up and down with excitement over something others cannot yet see. This time around that may as well be me.

Thursday, January 24, 2008
Innovators
I went to this building in Milford, CT, a grey industrial looking thing with tired blue trim. I'd heard about Avalence from my partner, Steve, and he had come back from meeting with them hopping up and down with excitement. "These guys," bounce, bounce, "make fuel from water."Debbie Moss, a principal in the company, she seemed extrememly pleasant and accomodating, so I honored my appointment which, as it turns out, was not to be with Debbie, but with Tom, the Chief Technical Officer. I walked in, introduced myself, "Miles Shapiro with BIOS Buildings Technologies," and I was shown to a metal chair and a random set of old magazines. I was told Tom would be with me shortly, and so he was. He took me through a room that had one of those lunch tables used in elementary schools in the South during the 1960's. The walls were grey. There was a water dispenser without water. We meandered through a brief hallway and headed left into what can only be described as a very large garage. There were these huge boxes, about the size of those boxes you used to see on "Let's Make a Deal," you know, the one's "behind where Carol Merrill is standing." Big. And each one of these boxes, some with an outside covering in blue plastic and others with grey metal coverings, had a regularly positioned cluster of metal cylinders, four feet long and no more than 4-5 inches in diameter. Out of the top end of each of the cylinders (it turns out the machine I was looking at had 24) two metal tubes, maybe 1/4 inch in diameter, poked out and led to black hoses that snaked in an arc somewhere into the machine. From below, one of those black tubes ran into the cylinder. Then it all goes into this big box like on the game show, and in the box are these scuba-looking tanks, only twice as long and thicker round and black. Of course there were a slew of buttons and electrical connections with color-coded wires and panels which opened up to stuff I wouldn't even bother trying to describe. Needless to add, I was in water a tad too deep for me to know what was really going on, but Tom was an extremely patient man, and more importantly, he liked to talk about what it was he was doing.He explained to me that in those cylinders were essentially two compartments separated by a thin membrane. In one compartment went the anode and in the other went the diode-- as an aside, I don't exactly know what those things are-- and from the bottom in comes water. Simple H2O, but rather pure or else all the other junk that might be in the water would sit on the bottom of the cylinder and build up and eventually short the entire thing out. So in short, you run two ends of energy through the water, which they refer to as electrolysis, which is not the removal of unsightly hair, but can be translated into shocking the crap out of the water, and the water molecules break into Hydrogen and Oxygen. So one of those tubes heading out of the top of the cylinder is the Hydrogen line and the other one is the Oxygen line. The big aqua lung containers in the machine store the Hydrogen. You then tap into the hydrogen and use it as fuel, just like you do when you use propane gas. Sounds fundamentally simple. Shock water, catch the two resultant gases. Use one as fuel. Sell the other to hospitals that need pure oxygen. I get it. However, the truly compelling element was more along my line of thinking, and that is the cost of the thing. Each little coupling on top of the cylinder, so there were two per cylinder and twenty four cylinders, each one of those was five dollars. Each one of the black hoses, carbon filtered tubing, cost 50 dollars. So you have 240 dollars in couplings, 2400 in tubes, and you haven't even gotten to the idea of welding the metal stuff together and correctly situating the anode and cathode and membrane for each cylinder. No wonder those things cost $200,000. Thus, the remainder of my discussion with Tom was about honing the designs of these machines for maximum production of hydrogen and then being able to reproduce each design without all of the difficulties in building a prototype. The idea of mass production of these things was beyond the ken. Tom was hoping to make maybe thirty to fifty of these machines of various sizes and capacities in a single year, because now they can only produce around ten, and each one is a one off.But the truth is, the one missing component is money... funding. And although these Avalence guys are amazingly innovative and perhaps have the final answer to the global warming crisis, they don't have sufficient funds to move forward quickly enough to warrant switching over to hydrogen fuel instead of petroleum. Car companies have designed prototypes for hydrogen run fuel cell cars, and in California, New York City, Washington, D.C. and a few other random outposts, some variant of Tom's machine sits in a gas station for hydrogen fueled cars to fill 'er up. But until enough people have enough of these cars, it won't be cost effective for gas stations to pay $200,000 for one of Tom's machines to only sell 3 pounds of hydrogen at 5000 pounds/square inch per car fill up. Now these cars with those three pounds will travel for 150 to 200 miles, probably as much as one would with a normal tank of gas, but the cost is no bonanza for the driver or the gas station owner, and therein lies the problem.It is about money folks! That is what it will always be about. And we can sit around and rub our hands together in worry until we make them chapped and bloody, but the global warming issue is not going to go away until somebody makes green=greed. I understand that sounds surgical and without conscience or feeling, but that is the real world. And the real world is going to get warmer and warmer until we find a way to make that hydrogen gas car a bargain for John Q. Public and me and you. But, you know what? After meeting Tom, and to a similar extent Debbie and Steve Nagy, another principal in this company of innovators, I believe they are going to sit in that ugly garage building and tinker and adapt and change and fix and fuss and finally, they are going to make it cheaper to be green. So there is hope.