Will the economy and the Housing Slump spur on Green Energy?

I can’t help wonder about the state of our economy and  what the impact will be on future decisions about old traditional homes. After all, didn’t people go just a little crazy buying up homes with very little regard to Energy Efficiencies? Well that was the story I received when I spoke to a housing developer in the Sacramento, California area. Their specialty was Energy Efficient housing. The problem was that buyers were not interested in lower energy bills at the cost of a higher mortgage rate. The result - the homes didn’t sell as expected. With all the electrical systems being carefully wired to Title 24 requirements to save energy, how does this filter down to the consumer level? It seems to me that the push towards green buildings and home buyers are putting the building contractors stuck between a rock and a hard spot.

Let me know what you think -

Would you rather save money, or go green?

Is there a middle ground?

What is it?
A surge protective device protects your electrical
equipment and appliances from voltage surges and
spikes that interfere with their normal operation.

What does it do?
Power surges can be generated from external
sources outside your home such as lightening, or
from internal sources inside your home such as
other electronics and appliances. You may be
unaware that surges also can enter through
telephone lines and cable TV or satellite dish
connections. These surges can cause immediate
physical damage to your appliances and electronics,
wear them down over time or create interferences
that cause them to malfunction.

This was interesting - When Installing fixtures and devices while finishing an improvement project, I reinstalled an existing Smoke Detector. After connecting the unit I noticed that the Green Power indicator did not light up. I double checked for power and found that all the breakers were on, but there was no voltage found on the smoke detector circuit. The occasional Red Indicator flashed, showing that the device was working on battery and communicating to the other detectors. I held down the test button and found that all of the home detectors worked just fine - on Battery.

I notified the homeowner who stated that he has never seen a Green Light on any of the smoke detectors.

The home is seven years old, and apparently the circuit has never been energized. The homeowner instructed me not to spend any time on the problem as he would notify the builder.

The owner indicated that the steam from the shower has occasionally set off the detectors, so he knew they were working.

Wow! Thank Goodness for the code that requires that 120 Volt Smoke Detectors with battery backup be installed.

Selection of generators and components should be made according to your particular application, keeping future loads into consideration. Continue reading this post…