Snow Blower Needed

Last winter was the first that my husband and I owned a house, so it was also the first winter that we were solely responsible for clearing snow from our driveway and sidewalks. Of course it was also one of the most active winters for snow so our one big shovel and a mini car/kid shovel got an excellent work out. We decided that never again would we only be able to clear one half of our driveway before our hands started to freeze in a gripped position, and this year we caved and bought a snow blower.

Snow blowers are as bad as lawn mowers when it comes to spewing fumes and junk into the air, so I wanted to make the best choice possible and that meant going electric. In most cases, electricity from power plants is created from cleaner burning than the gas and oil in a lawn mower or snow blower and in our case, we have a wind energy purchase agreement with our provider, so the amount of energy we use is then generated from wind farms, although the energy we receive may not be from the wind farms.

I know that our friends, family, and neighbors will laugh at us, but who couldn't use a little laugh every once in a while? We bought the Toro electric snow thrower and had two opportunities to try it out already.

And the verdict? It is a significant upgrade from shoveling! I cleared our drive way of 1-3 inches of snow in 10 minutes once I determined the best way to avoid running over the electric cord. That right there is the reason we got it and I am so happy. Of course it isn't perfect, and if you already own a gas powered snow blower, the Toro electric would probably feel like a significant downgrade. It's all plastic, so it's pretty light. This is good for me, but again, not if you're used to a metal blower. The two biggest downfalls for us is the need for an electric cord and the snow chute where the snow gets thrown out. Being tethered by a cord means that we have to stop and reroute the cord to reach both of our sidewalks (we live on a corner), but this still takes less time that shoveling. The chute is something we will be working on to modify. It theoretically has three positions to direct the snow, but once the blower is started and the snow comes out, the chute defaults to almost straight up. It still moves the snow, but now it's at the whim of the wind and sometimes backfires in our face.

And now for some action shots of my husband trying out the Toro for our second round of snow clean up. Look at that Toro go!

Trip Part 2.5: Philly's Spoke Problem

We were only in Philadelphia for a full day and some change by the time our late train (three hours late) got in and we had to catch our next one to Connecticut. We had a pleasant trip visiting Keith's cousins and staying with his aunt and uncle.

While in The City of Brotherly Love, we used the local rail system to get to and from the Amtrak station and downtown. It was pretty much like any other public rail system, but we found out from the cousins that they have a similar "wheel spokes" problem as the Cedar Rapids bus routes. They do have buses that help offset the problem and they allow full size bikes on the trains during off-peak hours. Folding bikes are always allowed!

The big negative was the cost. Off-peak, one-way rides from our "hotel" to the center of the city were $4.25 per person and peak, one-way rides were $5. Obviously people making this commute frequently would buy a month pass, but as a tourist it was more expensive than I had anticipated.

One of the great "green" things about our Philly trip was wandering around the downtown area and finding a great local ice cream shop, called Franklin Ice Cream or Franklin Fountain, that used bio-compostable spoons and garbage bags. They had really good ice cream and an untouristy, but historic appeal. I believe it is located on Market St. near the river. As we walked back from the river on Market St., we found The Big Green Earth Store and stopped in. They seemed relatively new and their website isn't quite up yet, but it would be great to see them grow and expand. The guy behind the counter was very friendly and informative. I loved that he wasn't overbearing with other customers that had stopped in to check out being green. The store had decorative and functional items including recycled glass bowls, recycled cardboard wall designs, bicycle chain frames and bowls, recycled dinnerware, cleaning supplies, home fragrances, solar backpacks, reusable bags, I could go on. They even had a laundry detergent refilling station which Keith dubbed The Vat. The idea is that you can bring in any container and fill it up with detergent, then pay for how much you take. You reuse containers and prevent more containers from entering the landfills.

Our Pennsylvania portion of the trip was short, but extremely fun and well worth the stop. Good luck to The Big Green Earth Store, and cheers for public transit that runs on time!

Give Your Mail Person a Break

How much mail do you get that you really need? Most of the stuff we put in our recycle bin is junk mail, and I am sick of getting catalogs for the people who previously owned our house. A few months ago we signed up with Catalog Choice to limit the amount of useless mail we receive. I have to say that I have noticed a significant difference, at least with catalogs, and it's free. They have all of the major catalogs and even more that I have never heard of. Their service makes it really easy to go in and cancel catalogs and magazines at any time. I try to do this at least once a week with any catalogs we may have received.

The next step I am taking is to stop the rest of the junk mail. I have read about some other services that work with all kinds of junk mail, but several require a fee: 41pounds and GreenDimes are a few. The best option I have found so far is through the Direct Marketing Association and costs $1, but in my opinion, that is one dollar well spent. You are able to put up to 5 names per address which is nice since I still get a lot of junk mail sent to my maiden name. I recently signed us up and was surprised by the "are you sure" page. They post the following information to try to convince you to stay on the list (I added the bold formatting to highlight certain content).

Important: you have selected to eliminate all mailings from organizations participating in the DMA Mail Preference Service.

What you will miss.

The average household can save 1200 dollars per year from marketing offers.
You will no longer receive savings offers from these companies.

In fact, you will no longer receive offers and special savings for more than 80 percent of all commercial offers.

And you will miss the environmental benefits of shopping at home rather than driving to the mall!

By replacing just two shopping trips to the mall each year with shopping by catalogs or direct mail, DMA estimates that Americans could:

• Reduce the amount we drive by 3.3 billion miles.
• Reduce carbon dioxide emissions by more than 3 billion pounds.
• Save more than $490 million on gas costs.

When you click here, your name will be removed from future consumer prospect lists and you will see a significant reduction in all catalog and other commercial offers. If you wish to reconsider, click here and uncheck the box removing your name from DMA's member prospect lists.

DMA and all its members support the Commitment to Consumer Choice guidelines designed to better serve consumers and your right to choose to receive more of what you want and less of what you don't want. If you have questions about the CCC please visit the DMA web site homepage.

I found it interesting that they were pointing out the environmental benefits to receiving junk mail. Perhaps some people drive to stores often enough that receiving tons of paper is healthier for the planet, but I don't fall into that category. Also, I would rather spend my time searching online for the few products that I shop for each year, than waste it sifting through junk mail to find the two coupons I would use. So here is to fewer pieces of junk mail and more time to spend reading useful things like books!

Build Your Home Green

On January 7th my husband and I, along with fellow poster Josh and his wife, attended a local workshop titled "Building a Sustainable Iowa". It was hosted by Center on Sustainable Communities and involved a presentation by Marc Richmond from Practica Consulting followed by the ability to visit with green vendors. The information was aimed at people building new homes or current homeowners wanting to make green choices.

I found the session very informative and presented from a reasonable point of view. Marc briefly covered what he called the "doom and gloom" side of building that we all hear about, but live so far away from. The majority of the time he discussed common misconceptions, pitfalls of making green choices, and tips. Here is a list of some of the items that really stood out for me:

• Every product that you purchase for your home from the building components to the paint and furnishings can contain harmful things like formaldehyde. These will "off-gas" for many years even if you can't smell it. Look for products with low or no VOCs and low or no formaldehyde.
• Don't get caught up in perfecting your projects. There are pros and cons to every choice so you have to do your research and find the products that fit the best with your goals.
  
• There are many green factors, so rank their priority for your purposes to stay focused. Some of the green factors mentioned were energy efficiency, sustainability, and indoor health.
• You may have a very efficient furnace, but if your duct work was done poorly and leaks, heating your home may be up to 30% less efficient than you think. Getting your system tested can point out areas that need to be sealed better.
• Insulation should completely fill the space between the studs. This has been a common problem with builders and is one of the easiest ways to lose money on heating your home. Watch insulation installation carefully if you are building a new home and remedy the problem if you have an existing home.
  
• Another good test for new and existing homes is a home pressure test. This will test for leaks around windows and doors, electrical sockets and other common culprits.
  
• Don't believe that green materials are always too expensive. Most green products are a few dollars more or even less than their counterparts, and if they are that close in price, why wouldn't you pay a few dollars more to make your home last longer and be healthier for your family? Isn't it worth it to raise your children in a safer environment?
  
• Green products have a lower quality than the old stuff, not! Marc pointed out that many green products have been on the shelf for years, but people don't think to look for them. A good example was paint. "Regular" paint hasn't changed for years, but low/no VOC paint has been evolving to keep up with regulations in states such as California. This means that eco-friendly paint is using the latest paint technology while the "good" paint is still using 20 year old technology.
  

The vendors at the show included companies involved with insulation, paint, windows, gas and electricity providers, construction and building materials that can be reused. I look forward to researching and possibly working with some of these companies for our home projects in the future.

CitizenRe Post 1: Rent Solar

This will be the first of a series of posts on CitizenRe.

I mentioned that my husband and I bought our first home last summer. We bought it because we like it, it's in a great neighborhood, it's close to my husband's office and he can drop me at a variety of bus stops on his way to work. We also bought it to grow into because we hate moving and will have kids some day. This last point means that it's bigger than we need right now, but my green side has come to terms with that because it also means that we are making long term decisions on improving it, more than just aesthetic modification.

The first major one is to add solar. For a long time this was a future goal because of the high up-front cost of solar combined with living in a state that doesn't have good solar rebates. This changed the day of the 2007 National Solar Tour. After visiting a local nature preserve that uses solar panels, we went out to lunch and found a flyer for CitizenRe, a company that promotes solar by renting and maintaining the setup through it's REnU program. The deal sounded really great which was the problem. It sounded way too good to be true. So I sat on it, talked it over with a coworker who has some hobby panels, and did some research online. I found that other people were concerned that it was a scam and there were plenty of arguments on both sides. Finally I decided to sign up and find out if it was real or not. I spent time reading through the terms and conditions and nothing looked fishy so I dove in.

I received a call from the sales manager assigned to us, but didn't answer so I only got the welcome message as a voice mail. Then we were sent papers to sign, confirming that we wanted to join the program. I recently received an email confirming that the papers arrived, but still no word about anyone coming to design our solar system. It is important to note that as of this date we have not been asked for social security numbers or any personal information other than our address and names and even the papers that we signed stated that we were not locked into anything until a systems engineer came and designed our solar setup and we approved it. I bring this up because the sites I found had incorrect statements along those lines.

I hope to have more exciting updates about our personal experience with CitizenRe, but for now, here are a few links that help prove that they are real if you believe what you see on TV.

CitizenRe on Living with Ed