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>> well, welcome to the imaf building inspection. this is our brown bag monthly talk on the third thursday, which we do every third thursday. today we're talking about green buildings and a green buildings for your home. i'm lawrence cornfield. i have laura en engle with me. laura works closely with the department of building inspection know to develop green building plans and to talk about green building stuff. and so of course, the first thing we have to say is laura what on earth do you mean when you say green building? what is a green building? >> a green building can mean a lot of different things. for a home, a lot of people say, i'm not a whole new building so what does that mean?

we'll talk about materials that are energy conserving or water conserving. it can mean a lot of different things to a lot of different people. >> in our handout and you shall have copies and if anybody needs copies any of the materials we have today you can call the information person in our agency, emily green, 558-6005. she'll mail or fax you copies. in our handout we tried to put a one sentence summary of our topic. our overall green building goal is to maintain a comfortable living in our home maintain resources, improving indoor environmental quality. this is not a holier than thou type talk. i'm not saying i always use unbleached paper in my house. we're not trying to say you have to live up to somebody else's

expectations or standards. this is simply an attempt to help you understand what the current thinking about green building is, and how you might choose to incorporate some of those things in your house. one of the big -- the big issues we're all confronting is energy. why are we confronting energy as a topic for green buildings? >> why? because it's a resource that is running scarce oon us. and because in san francisco we've got a big issue with the bayview hunters point plant. we're trying to promote energy efficiency and conservation. two different things. >> what is the difference? >> energy efficiency and energyconservation would be to turn off lights and be efficient, or to use more

efficient appliances in your home. if you buy a new refrigerator that is more energy efficient, it doesn't take as much energy to run that appliance. >> lighting and lighting controls, if you have the obvious issues with regard to lighting, how much light do you need? the building code sets minimum standards for lighting in residential occupants. but you can -- occupancies. you can use the regular, the standard amount, what you do is you get a bulb that says standard. you're not messing around. this is a standard. they could say regular but they choose to say regular. this is the ace hardware, 75-watt bulb. relatively short expec expect e.

>> picking this out, they have cool light, or cool white, warm white, and i think it was day light. and so the compact fluorescents i think the industry realized the original light was really ugly. people didn't want to incorporate it into their home because everybody looked blue. now they have a better product. these you don't have to change for about ten years. they're really energy efficient. >> eight times longer life compared with the thousand-hour bulb, this one doesn't say how many hours it is on it, i don't think, does it? no. but the one thing that you often have problems with these, is you

cannot use these with dimmers unless they're specifically approved to use with dimmers. okay. less energy, longer life, save the planet, less maintenance. you're not as likely to fall off the ladder. >> yes. >> less than $5. >> i feel like we're on "the price is right." >> you bee win that one. >> a surprise for the day. >> right. now, here i said you can't use some of these things with dimmers, many lights you can use with dimmers. here's a dimmer. people say i don't want to put dimmers in. this one cost five bucks. it's a really yucky dimmer but -- junky dimmer. but it's rated. do you save power when you dim? >> it reduces the amount of

energy that the light is using. >> so there you go. suppresses radio frequency interference. it used to be that dimmers, you'd hear buzzes when you dimmed them down. but these have radio suppressors. >> you'll find everything is about $5. makes it easy for us. i think that that was only about three or $4. >> really, really cheap. >> really inexpensive. >> what do we want to say about lighting? there's a new energy code. the 2005 california energy code. and if you were building a new building, or if you are building a new addition, or a residential remodel, as james is doing, he's going to be required to meet, depending on whether you've got your permit before or after august 1st of this year, 2005, you might have to meet the new california energy code, which requires very sensitive lighting controls. it requires that you have

occupancy sensors or other types of reduced lighting controls in many rooms. and i'm not sure what the rooms are. do we have somebody here from mechanical section? what you're going to see over the next few years is a tremendous tightening up of energy controls. where you basically can't leave lights on. if they don't see movement within a specific period of time, lights will go off. somebody has already filed a complaint with the department to say, this is discriminatory for people with disabilities. we'll deal with that. the new energy code, california is way hea ahead of the country. we have a whole staff that does energy code compliance. the new energy code by the way has to be under special inspection. after the project is done, somebody comes, not a city but a special outside inspector who

comes and checks the energy stuff. so it's really, really tightening up, amazing. lighting and controls. any questions or comments on lighting? how about these fluorescent lights in the office? terrible, huh? >> thayer not necessarily terrible -- they're not necessarily terribly, but pacific gas and electric has a lighting lab and they offer to do lighting examinations as well. >> pacific gas and electric has the energy center. >> yes, pacific energy center down on howard street between 4th and 5th. and they have all kinds of free classes. >> fantastic place. pacific energy center. >> how are they to the landfills now? >> good question. the question was, how safe are they to throw the new compact florfluorescents? >> there is going to be a new rule that is going to be

preventing these lights from going into the landfill. there is a woman in the department of environment deals with residential toxicity. you can call the toxic reduction program at the department of environment and they'll be able to provide you some information as to what's happening with the rules and disposal of the lamps. >> hooting and -- heating and cooling, we've got a lot of stuff to talk about. heating and cooling, san francisco is of course the world's finest environment so most people don't have to heat or cool their homes. it's perfect here,alities perfect. cooling load is not a problem, climate zone 3. most people don't have cooling. the only place necessary their homes, commercially, yes, heating or cools -- cooled. this building could be in topeka or anyplace, minnesota, it is designed as a separate entity.

it's got a huge heating or cooling, no matter what happens, it can maintain temperature. doesn't need that in san francisco. we're developing standards, operable buildings, get away from this standard mon monolithc concept. most people don't heat or cool tear homes, except for those particularly hot or cold days. how many in san francisco has -- nobody in this room. when you you get really cold, the code says you've got to use it. >> how many times do you use it? a couple times a year? >> you get those cold or heat systems. i would just put on a jacket, right? >> you're an exception. >> if you're using heating, you know, and cooling, most fans

have filters and replacing the filters every now and then are a good idea. but as we're saying so few people use it, you hardly need to consider it. but definitely look at, because the more this thing gets filled up, especially if you're doing a remodel in your house, the dust and junk gets collected, you may be reducing the air flow. that would be the purpose of it. >> efficiency. >> efficiency. we can pass that around. i don't know how you dispose of it but yes, okay. so heating. in other climate zones where you have real serious heating and cooling loads, commercial buildings, people like to make the buildings very tight, so you don't have heat leakage or you're not losing air and you make the windows reflective. we in san francisco i strongly encourage people to have as much fresh air and infiltration as they possibly can.

it's an indoor air quality issue. people say i have mold and mildew all over my closets, there's mold and mildew all over my bathroom. what can i do? the answer is obvious to me, open the windows, open the door, and leave them open. now, people say, i get cold. before you go in the bathroom, to take a shower, close the window, so it's not open during -- and then as soon as you're done open the window and leave it open. now, people say well, i'm worried somebody is going to come in through the bedroom window. and so here's what we have. we have these little window locks that you put on the side of the window, so you can only open the window, six or seven inches. leave your windows open. indoor air quality means getting

rid of the extra moisture in your house so mold and mildew doesn't have a chan chance to g. this is a real critical thing. what do you think? >> less than $5. i think that natural ventilation is really important and it also provides a healther environment for you. it is a fresher air and cleaner air. we have a question here in the back. but i'm a big fan of natural ventilation myself. >> a lot of people are concerned, i'm going to get cold. how do you deal with it? >> put on a sweater. >> put on a sweater. that's what i do, too. >> has anyone invented one of these types of things that will operate with the new plastic framed windows? >> a lot of these new so-called plastic windows are -- >> they're vinyl. >> are wood covered by some kind of vinyl. it's a pretty low-grade wood, it is a vinyl that has got a

limited life expectancy. i can screw into the wood, whatever it's made out of. they work with that. electric resistance heat. is a terribly inefficient way to heat a building. basically what you're doing is short circuiting the electricity in your house to create a wire that heats up. and that's what this thing does. very, very inefficient, extremely expensive to operate. the heater cost $18 or something. it's cheap to put it in whereas if you put in a gas furnace it's going to be expensive. this is part of our electrical load problem in san francisco. what we have is a peak load and we have a hard time meeting the demand at the time of peak load.

the demand is between 4:00 and 7:00. energy guys say, it's because people go home and turn on their electric items, including electric resistance heaters. what do you -- >> i think they're not very good. the guy came into the department of environment, he swas explaininwaswasexplaining his h. he says it's gold and drafty and we've got a bump of these heaters around because it's so closed. we talked about opening your curtains, getting natural day light, heat from the day, he had insulation problems also, it was very drafty in his house. so he needed to put down some carpets and fix some of his elaboration. i haven't had him call back

again. >> there is a moderately new product called a direct vent wall furnace. doesn't require a flue or chimney. all you need is a wall that's open to a yard or a court with the right distance from the next property, and you can actually take the fresh air in, heats it up, and well, let's see, it brings the fresh air in, uses that for combustion air, to burn in the fire box, and then it exhausts it through the same opening in the wall. >> let's say you just want to heat the bedroom, not the whole house, what's the more economical? >> what do you think? >> i don't know if i know the true answer to that. >> i can't imagine one of these things is the answer. i think the answer is to first of all go back to when your house was built, and find out

what was the intended heat source. because all houses are required to have been built with heat that meets the minimum standard. and few of them were built with electric heat. so what i often find is, people say there's an old gas furnace but it doesn't work, especially in these old victorians. replacing or repairing them is probably is economical solution. these things, you know, it's creditablelincrementally, over , putting in a new or replacement gas furnace is expensive up front, over the life cycle cost it will be tremendously more efficient. >> what about window covers? >> curtains? curtains are good. >> what is the best type to keep the room warm? >> anything that will block out the breeze. because in san francisco, a lot of the windows are -- single pane and very breezy.

if the breeze is what's bother being you, it's heavy enough to block the breeze. the products that you can look af at that are more natural products that are better for the indoor environmental quality. so i have a quick question. when you said warming the bedroom is it because feet are freezing cold? >> everything, especially feet. >> a little hot water bottle that can you fill up and stick at the bottom of your bed and then your feet aren't freezing cold and it will help warm you up. you aren't using all the energy with your fan and you don't have electricity on your body all night. we'll put that back in the energy category then. >> there seem done recently a plethora of oil-filled heaters. are they any better? >> i think it is still electric

resistance heating under a different name. >> don't they add an feafkt danger iaffect ofdanger? >> they are relative safe. that is just a prettier looking and it doesn't -- one of the issues with this is it's either on or it's off. you're getting a lot of heat or you're not. the oil filled electric resistance heaters sort of coast. this gentleman here. >> i'm now facing designing an addition over a garage, second unit. and i'm looking at radiant floor heating versus these direct-vent wall furnace heating. i wondered if you could give me feedback on life cycle, cost, efficiency, anything like that. >> it's heated water and it actually provides a better source of heat just because it's not blowing on you and it's a

preferable source of heat just in that aspect. i don't know like cycle cost. >> maybe michael can shed light on that. >> there is two efficiencies for gas boilers. if you have if highest efficiency boiler, you can save money. today's zoned control forced air systems use a computer controlled technology that allows one central furnace to heat individual rooms in the house and to make them all comfortable and to do so efficiently. because it senses the heat demand for each room and generates just enough heat in the furnace to heat that one room. so with the computer-controlled zone heating system, you get the best of both worl worlds. you get a forced air system that can you lollize from roo -- locm room to room. >> batteries, more or energy. batteries. what do we say about batteries? >> recycled batteries.

>> look at this. oh, my god! >> this is just from your department? >> this is just from this floor. >> just from this floor. can you see this, oh, heavy. >> here is all of our batteries. hundreds and hundreds. so the city has a policema prakf recycling batteries. >> whole foods, they just started. >> what you want to do in your home if you wish is to have a limb bucket, and peak sure, now these -- little bucket, now make sure, these things leak all kinds of horrible chemicals. make sure it's within a plastic bag or something inside this. take it to the hardware store. >> there is a couple of places around the city that are dropoff places for household hazardous waste. we put the number up on the board. we'll have information about

battery drop-off zones as well. >> why don't you talk about this as an alternative while i go wash my hands. excuse me. >> this is the emergency radio. all these just gadgets. you've probably seen a couple of different types o types of emery radios. if we have a problem, there's probably not going to be electricity. and batteries, it's always up to you to replace your batteries. this is one that winds up and it lasts for a couple of hours so you'll be able to have all the information, the emergency information that you need. can you all see this? and you get these? these are available at hardware store, l. l. bean has them, for $20. this was how much, lawrence? >> less than 30. the sharper image.

>> as well. >> two short wave channels. solar electric, there's lots to say. department of the energy, has detailed informs about solar electric. basically get an overthe counterpermit to put a solar electric system on your home. so we're doing our best to make it happen. i know the mayor -- it's a high point on mayor newsom's agenda for solar electric but it's expensive, right? >> it is expensive but there are rebates that are available. there are state and national rebates, with the new energy act there is new rebates that are available. but we do have a whole section in our department that deals solely with renewable energy. >> who do we call? >> 355-3700. our main number. >> so solar, too.

solar and pretty much anything. >> pretty much everything. >> and there are people there that can talk about the special program that can match up the special program with the consumers to help facilitate that. let's see we've got a microphone here. >> i live in pacifica although i live in san francisco. i put solar panels, 16 peanls a yeapanels ayear ago. with the rebates it cost me $13,000 to install. it was like $80 to $100 a month in electrical bills that i had before. so it's a ten- or 12-or 15-year pay back. so figure it out, it will last, the last 15 years are going to be totally free. >> solar electric water heat, other parts of the country we see solar heatin heating everywe

some here we see it infrequently. it was based on the financial -- the rebate issue, and incentives, federal and state incentives. and they went away, so solar water heating went away for the most part. i've hardly seen any solar water heating since then. >> old hot water heaters are a loss problem because they have stand-by heat loss. right there sitting there oozing heat all day all night. and so the way -- ways you can resolve the heating problem is buying a new one which has int grat insulation, make sure -- integral insulation. five feet of the cold intake and all the hot water pipes coming out of it should be insulated. typical insulation, probably $5

too. most homes are not ibs lated, water heater, few other things, attic. >> this one here is if you're using recycled content is important, this is a blue jeans and treated with borate keeping the bugs out and it is fire-resistant. a cellulose product is recycled newspaper, some people helping with the waste stream actually you know make a closed loop, something like this could be very important to them. >> and speaking of the borate in other products that keep the bugs out -- >> good transition. >> the ground up newspaper they used for insulation is borate in it. they mix some kind of organic

borate product to ceem the bugs from nesting in it. home pest management is a serious problem. in my life, in my home, the ants which i consider my friends are not considered friendly by other people who live in my house. so we have to deal with ants. and the ants are -- there are a couple of ways to deal with ants and other little bugs, right? and the way that i first tried to deal with them is to spry these horrible chemicals around the house which basically meant that i couldn't go home for a day or two until i opened up the windows. and in fact didn't get rid of the ants. my wife found orange guard. this is a whole series of natural products that is basically an extract of orange peel. and this just gets -- those ants are gone, you know? you spray it, let it sit there, wipe it up, whatever it says, they go, that's it. there is a whole bunch, there's

one that is based on lemons, and so on. >> with those kinds of products you want to make sure that you're not introducing big serious chemicals into your home. and look at different design strategies that you're going to use if you are remodeling your home. also introducing chemicals, products that are less toxic. really important. >> so this was about $5. >> just about. [laughter] >> for that bottle actually. that spray stuff, someone was just before the meeting today was talking about, you want to give them the microphone? was talking about water quality issues related to pesticides. >> it was an article on npr this morning actually. they said the largest source of toxic chemicals in the streams these days is ant poison believe it or not. because people go around and they have the outside of their house sprayed, the whole foundation, a lot of people pest control people who are spraying a lot of toxic chemicals and