By Matthew O’Malia
Special to Roll Call
June 22, 2009, 5:43 p.m.

Read the Article at the Roll Call

I am a small-business owner and partner in G•O Logic LLC of Belfast, Maine, a design and building company building the next generation of sustainable, energy-efficient homes. So I understand first-hand the importance of investing in clean energy and the importance of Congress strengthening the Clean Energy and Security Act. If we invest in a clean energy economy now, we’ll create millions of jobs and set our country on a track to compete in a 21st century economy. Not only will my small business and thousands of others like mine be able to expand, but all of the local businesses we rely on for manufacturing, shipping, storage and many other tasks will benefit as well.

Buildings consume 40 percent of the energy produced in the United States, more energy than all of the cars on the roads today. And while automobile fuel efficiency is seriously debated as a path to save energy and money, building energy performance has not received as much scrutiny, even though we have the tools and technology to create super-efficient buildings today. A strong renewable electricity standard will mean these tools get used and these jobs created to make our buildings more efficient and begin to build the foundation of an American new energy economy.

G•O Logic has developed home designs that reduce energy consumption by 90 percent for space heating and 80 percent overall. These houses look and feel like custom-designed, conventional homes and are built for average construction costs. The energy efficiency comes from cost-effective design improvements — thicker walls with a lot more insulation, better passive-solar utilization, and an air-tight envelope coupled with a heat-recovery ventilation system. In simple terms, a 90 percent more energy-efficient home saves an enormous amount of money and energy — around $90,000 in heating costs, 22,000 gallons of heating oil, and 285 tons of CO2 over the term of a 30-year mortgage.

A stronger renewable energy standard in the energy bill would provide small businesses, like mine, with an important opportunity to provide quality, energy-efficient housing that people can afford to build and heat and cool. And this opportunity would not just benefit small businesses. It would also create an entirely new market for green jobs that are good-paying, skilled and valuable to the economy. And these are jobs that can never be shipped overseas.

In fact, study after study has shown that investing in clean energy creates jobs, and at a far faster rate than investments in dirty energy sources like oil and coal.

Researchers at the University of Massachusetts found that investments in clean energy produce two to three times as many jobs as investments in dirty energy. The Department of Energy and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory have issued similar findings.

Why settle for half as many jobs when we could have double or even triple?

And don’t forget that creating more energy-efficient homes and businesses will jump-start the local economies in a multitude of ways. Once homes and businesses stop wasting energy, it means more money in people’s pockets. The Department of Energy’s home weatherization program cuts energy costs by an average of 30 percent per home. Those savings will spur consumer spending — helping to create even more jobs.

A strong American Clean Energy and Security Act can open new doors to future green jobs, a green economy and energy security. G•O Logic, among other innovative small businesses, is ready to help lead the way, with the skills and vision necessary to implement this ambitious plan. But we need the help of elected officials. I urge Congress to act now to create a stronger energy bill that will provide the support needed for a strong green economy and a brighter future.

Matthew O’Malia is principal of G•O Logic LLC, a design and building company in Belfast, Maine.

I am all for economic stimulus- especially stimulus headed in my direction. Given the new administration, and that I am in the business of building super energy-efficient homes that save homeowners money and the planet a lot of pain and suffering, you would think I would be buried in Stimulus, right? Sort of- but not really.

The recent Stimulus act extended, and in some cases, expanded tax breaks for weatherizing your home (insulation, windows, roofing material, etc). Given the poor energy performance standards of most in this country- that is a good thing. The recent Stimulus act is also getting behind renewable home energy systems like wind, solar, and geothermal. And while expensive renewable energy systems are not the most cost-effect way to spend your tax dollars when it comes to saving energy, why not? They look cool, and it gives your neighbors something to aspire to.

But here are the rubs about the rules in the new Stimulus Package:

RUB 1. Existing vs. New Construction: When it comes to energy efficient improvements to homes, insulation, roofing, windows and door tax credits only apply to old houses! If you are building new, you need to foot the bill for the energy efficient upgrades yourself. Doing the right thing with building shell upgrades (which is the most cost-effect option for saving energy) in new construction is not supported by Uncle Sam! One could certainly make the case that older homes need more help with improving their efficiency- but the fact is, depending on how you build a new home, it needs the same amount of upgrading if you really want to make a dent in the global energy problem. So, if tax incentives are not used to improve new construction, then the government should raise the building code’s standards for new construction energy efficiency. Use a carrot or stick- but do something!

RUB 2. No Passive Solar: If you are renovating your old farm house in Maine, and you are going to be adding new windows to seal up the drafts, let the sun shine in and make the most of passive solar gain, I have bad news for you… The only windows that the stimulus package will pay for are windows that reject 70% of the sun’s heat energy that hits the glass! In other words, your south facing windows will loose more heat than they will gain. That sunroom you are renovating is going to be a net loser of heat with your fancy new stimulus-enabled retrofits! How?

Windows have two basic ratings to determine their energy performance. The first is the U value, which, in a nut shell, describes how much heat conducts through the window unit, (or how much heat it “loses”). The second rating is the SHGC (solar heat gain coefficient). This number describes how much solar heat energy passes through the glass (or how much solar heat the window “gains”). In a G•O Logic home, that SHGC number is .6, meaning 60% of the sun’s energy enters the home. The stimulus package window requires the SHGC to be below .3 or 30%. If you are in Texas that’s just fine, because Texas has many more days that you need to cool than days that you need to heat, so blocking solar gain is generally good. But in Maine (and the rest of the northern portion of the US), that number is a huge disadvantage! Solar energy is the largest free energy resource, and to think people will be incentivized by the government to avoid its use is crazy–is W. still in charge of the energy policy or what? To give an example of what a SHGC does to heat load in a residence in Maine, I revised one of our energy models to show the difference between the tax incentive windows vs non–tax incentive windows in a typical G•O Logic House.

tax incentive windows (.3 U, .3 SHGC) and the resulting energy use and space heating cost per year in a 1500 sqft G•O Logic Home:

253 gallons LP ($708/yr space heating costs with LP at $2.80/gallon)

non–tax incentive windows (.19 U, .6 SHGC) and the resulting energy use and space heating cost per year in a 1500 sqft G•O Logic Home:

94 gallons LP ($264/yr space heating costs with LP at $2.80/gallon)

That translates into a huge amount of wasted energy and money over time–the difference is approximately $444/yr in space heating! You will spend your $1,500 tax credit in extra heating costs in less than 4 years and you’ll be losing money every year after that. If the government is going to provide incentives to save energy, they should at least do something that will make a difference!

RUB 3: Alternative energy systems: A Photovoltaic (PV) array is a thing of beauty. I am glad there are tax incentives available for G•O Logic homes to upgrade to net zero using tax payers’ money. But the reality is, PV is expensive technology for the amount of energy savings it produces. For example, in Maine, if you invest an equal amount of money in upgrading your home’s shell (higher insulation, better windows, air sealing, etc) and buying a fancy PV array, the money invested in improving your home’s shell will be four times more effective in saving energy than the energy produced by the PV array. So, I am glad people are excited about making a statement about their belief in saving energy and the environment with using PV, but the reality is, I would prefer not to have my tax dollars spent that inefficiently!

Now, having said that, we definitely believe in adding PV to a home that has undergone thorough energy upgrading, to the point where its annual heat load is in the realm of 5,000-10,000 btu’s/SF, or a new house with the same specs (about 10x less enegy used than standard construction). Here’s how it would work: the G•O Logic 1500 home is modeling to be in the ballpark of 5,333 btu’s/SF annual heat load, and if we meet that load with an air-source heat pump with a coefficient of performance of 2.5, the electric demand to meet the space heating requirement is less than 1,000 kWh/year. At today’s electricity rates that’s $160 per year for space heating (in Maine!).

If we meet this heating demand with PV we’d only need an 800-watt array, grid-tied to supply energy to the grid when the sun’s shining, and to take back from the grid when the sun goes down. We’d pay $6,400 for the photovoltaic array to cover the space heating demand, get 30% back from the tax credit, for a net cost of $4,480. If we put that into a mortgage calculator at 5% interest for 15 years, we’ll pay $35 a month for it (we also get to deduct some of the cost of the mortgage interest for another little savings.) Over 12 months that’s $420, but you’re saving the cost of the electricity ($160) for a net cost of $260 a year for 15 years. At that point, and all along the way, who knows what the cost of electricity will be. If it rises 6% a year, for instance, in fifteen years the rate will be $.38 kWh, and now that 1,000 kWh will be worth $383, and you’re saving all of that, making up for the PV cost and then some in a short while. It’s a hedge investment, but one thing we can all be sure of is energy prices are not going to be going down in the medium-to-long term.

The big picture is that if the government is going to influence how and what we spend our money on with tax incentives, they should at least support investment choices that make sense for the entire country and verify that those incentives result in cost-effective energy saving solutions.

For more information see:

http://www.energystar.gov/index.cfm?c=products.pr_tax_credits#s1