Ok, I'm going to try and cover some ground in this post.
I dunno. I don't think anyone should have nukes, including the US, but I sure as hell don't want North Korea to have them.
Yeah now that I think about it I don't trust the nine or so countries that have the nukes now. I guess I just don't like how there is one set of rules for the US, France, UK, etc., and another for everyone else.
Sure, I too would rather live in a world where nuclear weapons did not exist. However, we have them for the same reason we started working on improving our nuclear weapons right after WWII. (If someone has nukes, and we don't, or have much better nukes we may possibly be screwed.) And most people don't want to risk the lives of millions of people on Russia/China/France/whoever who has nukes to not nuke us. It's sad, but that's just how it is.
As for the energy efficency in houses, god you don't even want to know how much I know about that stuff. I grew up in a household filled with nothing but energy efficency. Currently I'm working on a house in California getting it down to insulation levels of a passive house (mostly covering the seams with this compound and installing additional insallation.(see Bissig's link) I've been inside the first passive house built in the USA (In Minnesota, if you're curious) The house I grew up in now has solar panels and often generates negative electric bills. AC's, while I think they can be nice, really are an inefficient way to cool buildings.
Being a homeowner myself now (and watching energy bills climb up during the hot and cold parts of the year) I'd love to hear your thoughts on passive buildings. Google has yielded some interesting results, but you seem to work "in the field" so I'd be interested in your ideas. Since some areas of the country have more temperature fluctuations than others, some ideas don't work as well (such as heat pumps or wet cooling); Is it feasible to try to get a building to be passive or close to it in the Northeast?
Well, like janev said, there is difference in temperature in different areas of the "Northeast," however, you should be fine. The real temperature challenge in building "passive" houses and similar in the USA, isn't the actual heat/cold of the area, it's the fact that because passive houses are a relatively new concept (especially in the USA) that there isn't much actually known about how to construct it for the area. For example, it's a real challenge out here in California, because there really hasn't been anything done in the field in this area. Where you live however, the climate will likely be closer to that of Germany's, and thus there will be examples to draw on. In California we're having to do a lot of guesswork as to the proper amounts of things for this climate, however if done right a passive-style house can work just about anywhere.
Something can be very helpful for many people, especially in cold areas where you live is the insulation, similar to what we're doing here. In California here it rarely gets under 40 during the day and ~25-30 during the night, so you will likely need a bit more in terms of heating, however if our calculations are correct, we expect the house to be able to use their heat for 30 min in the morning, and 30 min at night, and the whole house will be warm for the entire day.
I'm not sure what you mean by my "thoughts." If you have any other specific questions I'll do my best to answer them.
Solar panels are a great way to save electricity costs, and the environment at the same time, but if you plan on moving in less than 8 years I wouldn't bother, anything over 10 years and you'll start to see profit for sure. And that's just buying solar panels yourself, there are now many government programs/corporate options to help pay for the cost. You can get loans with 0 down payment and very low interest from places which can help with the cost.
@Janev and Rocinante too: Those fireplaces sure are a better choice than your standard fireplace, but when it comes down to it, a fireplace in a standard house really isn't that great. (It get exponentially less helpful if your house was built before around 1990.) Because of the typically poor insulation in most American houses, any heat you send into the room from the fireplace is usually all going to be sucked outside in a matter of an hour or so, minutes if you have an older house. What this means is that all you are doing from burning your wood is heating a space +-15 feet around the fireplace. This is no help if you are 40 feet away in your bedroom or wherever. As I'm sure you know, the way a modern thermostat works is it regulates the temperature in your house by measuring the temperature and then if it is colder than your set level, increasing heat. When it has reached your desired temperature it shuts off, and waits until the temperature drops again, thus saving energy. The problem is again with leaks, if your heat is constantly escaping outside you need to have the heat going all the time just to keep the house warm. With proper insulation, you can have the heater on for only about an hour a day, as I mentioned earlier. Another important thing in saving heat and energy and money is mechanical ventilation. (Not the life saving technique you'll likely find if you search Wikipedia
) What this mostly does is channels your old stale air outside, and transfers all the heat to the intake valves, thereby warming a lot of the incoming air without needing extra heat from the thermostat.
On another side of electricity saving is
CFLs, or Compact Fluorescent Lighting. This is one thing which I can not understand why more people aren't using it. I can understand people's hesitation to use solar, (long term investments + a lot of hassle to set up) but CFLs are instant money savers. Here is a quote from Wikipedia:
"While the purchase price of an integrated CFL is typically 3 to 10 times greater than that of an equivalent incandescent lamp, the extended lifetime and lower energy use will more than compensate for the higher initial cost.[19] A US article stated "A household that invested $90 in changing 30 fixtures to CFLs would save $440 to $1,500 over the five-year life of the bulbs, depending on your cost of electricity. Look at your utility bill and imagine a 12% discount to estimate the savings."[20]"
Next... Ah yes windows. These are a big way to lower your energy bill as they are the source of a lot leaking. If you can afford it, triple pane windows are the way to go, they allow pretty much 0 air to leak through, and will help keep your house warm/cool. (You would likely be very surprised at how much old windows leak.) If you ever see blower-door testing of a house (closing all windows and doors in a house, and than opening one door and covering it with a tarp with a hole in it for a fan, thus allowing you to blow air into the house to find where it escapes) you'll find that hundreds of square feet of air per min (typical measuring unit for this) escape through windows. I would advise to look around for places to buy good insulated windows (and doors too if you can) to see what you can afford. Speaking of doors, if you have any older rolling doors, those often leak a lot, tri-fold doors are the best way to go.
OH EDIT: I think this was briefly mentioned somewhere in the thread previously, but unpluging various electronics can save a lot of energy. I used to think this wasn't much of a big deal, but if you look it up you'll see "vampire electronics" can end up using quite a bit of electricity (and thus costing you more money.) The best way to deal with this is to buy a few 6 (or so) plug outlet strips, and plug them in in various places where you have a lot of electronics plugged in. (Office, kitchen, etc.) Switch all your various devices to be plugged into outlets, and then when you leave home, or go to sleep, flip the power switch to shut it all down. Turn the power switch back on when you come home, or wake up, and you are easily saving youself money.
Doing my best to explain the technology and such that we have been discussing. If anyone has questions feel free to ask. I don't claim to be any super expert, but I do know a lot about this, and I'll do my best to help. Rocinante, I'm sure you didn't mean this much info
and I know you probably aren't going to be running off to do a bunch of changes, but what I mentioned are some of the best ideas/ways for saving energy and money that I know of.
@Silver: The USA (I assume that is what "our country" is) is not going to just go nuking people (I really hope) but there's something called MAD, which is, thus far the best defensive strategy we (or anyone) have for nukes. Of course, if some crazy dictator or some such person got his hands on such a device, I would certainetly be worried.
