The Dallas Green Zine

Styrofoam recycling can be expensive and there aren’t as many takers for it as there are for plastics 1 and 2, so you might want to write down this Dallas location… 

If you haven’t tossed all that Styrofoam packing from all your nifty Christmas/Holiday presents, there’s a place nearby that recycles white Styrofoam:

Metro Styrofoam
1628 Terre Colony Ct
Dallas, TX 75212
(214) 231-3626
Click here for a map.

It’s just off the westbound access road of I30 between Hampton and Westmoreland.  The best way to get there is to exit I30 at Hampton and take the old Westmoreland turnoff (keep right instead of going left to Hampton South).  Turn right on to Terre Colony Ct;  it’s on the right past Lone Star Dr but before the road curves.  It’s not well marked, but it’s just before a fenced-in area.

Drop you foam off at the dock (might be restricted to only during business hours).  DON’T TOSS IT INTO A DUMPSTER. 

This is from Dennis Hyde who is with the Dallas Water Utilities Water Conservation Division…

I would like to bring to your attention one of the Free programs for Dallas Water Utilities customers in which I am responsible. We are offering Free irrigation Audits for homes that have an outdoor sprinkler system. This is strictly a volunteer program, and could possibly save the customer money on a monthly basis, as well as save the natural resource of water. Please feel free to contact me for further information, and if interested we could attend any meetings that are held to share this exciting program as well as others. Thank you very much for your time.

Dennis Hyde
Landscape Irrigation Auditor - Dallas Water Utilities
Licensed Irrigator 7640, Licensed Backflow Tester 9558
1500 Marilla, Room 5as
Dallas, TX 75201

214-670-3434

http://www.savedallaswater.com

RideSearch.com, a commuter networking site focused on carpooling, has recently launched. The site serves as a groundbreaking communications platform for users looking to find a carpool and save gas, money and the planet.
Carrollton, TX (PRWEB) December ##, 2007 – Motivium Consulting, Inc. announces the launch of RideSearch.com, an online commuter networking site focused on carpooling. RideSearch.com is a valuable and groundbreaking communication tool that offers a mainstream carpool solution for people who want to rideshare with other commuters.

“RideSearch.com is a carpool site that promotes the concept of ridesharing for all commuters,” says Brian Bass, CEO of Motivium Consulting, Inc. “Our mission is to encourage carpool safety and effective communication to empower everyday commuters to initiate a carpool.”

RideSearch.com will offer a number of features that are unique to, and will enhance the experience of the nationwide carpooling market. The release date is set for January 1, 2008.

RideSearch.com’s subscription search tool allows users to access the detailed profile of any subscriber who has an interest in carpooling. With its innovative carpool routing application, RideSearch.com will generate maps of users’ routes for searching by others who live and work nearby. RideSearch.com has the ability to allow users to anonymously and securely communicate with other subscribers.
“Even after a carpool is agreed upon, the user can continue communicating using this site and the carpool can add new members to further increase their savings of gas,” Bass says.  “There is no other site like this that allows for such security.  RideSearch takes the matchmaking Web site model and allows users to be very selective about who they carpool with.”

RideSearch.com provides users with the ability to view profiles of other users that live along their commuting route. The mapping software provided by ArcWeb Services allows each user to input their starting location by intersection instead of home address, thereby adding a higher level of security. RideSearch.com will utilize Microsoft SQL Server 2005 and ASP.Net for its infrastructure, allowing for greater reliability and performance of this site. Motivium Consulting, Inc. is a member of Microsoft’s Empower for Independent Software Vendors program, enabling the site to work with the latest in Microsoft technologies.

“The time is now for carpooling,” Bass says.  “With gas prices at an all-time high and the economy simmering, the idea of carpooling becoming mainstream could even change the environment, the economy and the pocketbooks of all Americans.  It is up to us to be the hero now.”  

For more information about RideSearch.com, a profit-driven organization, visit http://www.ridesearch.com/.

. . . . . . . .
About Motivium Consulting, Inc:
Motivium Consulting Inc. is a Carrollton, Texas-based company that specializes in the application of .Net and related technologies to the tasks of design and development of high quality Internet/Intranet Web sites and high speed desktop and server applications. Motivium Consulting, Inc. (http://www.motivium.com) was formed in December 2005 by Brian Bass, the sole owner and employee. Motivium’s current activities involve sub-contract work for the Department of the Treasury through Lockheed Martin, Inc. for the Internal Revenue Service. Motivium’s solo projects include the creation of RideSearch.com (http://www.ridesearch.com/) — a next generation carpooling application.

It’s that time of the year again when tens of catalogs start arriving in the mailbox. Not only is it a big time-consuming hassle to sort through them, but there’s also the awful feeling of wasting lots paper. Have you ever wondered how much paper and forest destruction is involved?

 

According to Catalog Choice, 19 billion catalogs (and yes, that’s a ‘b’) are mailed out to American consumers each year, requiring 53 million trees and 3.5 million tons of paper. But not only millions of trees are destroyed, but paper processing of this volume requires mind-blowing excesses of energy and water.

Well, now there’s a way to opt out! Catalog Choice provides a free service that can help you reduce mailbox clutter and save natural resources. Through this free service, you can sign up and specify which catalogs you do not want arriving at your house. (Unfortunately, since it takes 10 weeks for Catalog Choice to process this, you probably won’t be able to stop this holiday’s deluge–but there’s always next year.)

Also, as you go through the list and click ‘Decline’ next to each catalog that you don’t want sent to your mailbox, you will see a request for a customer number. If you don’t have the catalog in front of you, just click Not Available, and the request can still be processed without a customer number.

And again, this service is totally free, and it’s a great way to save some trees.

Is green building and affordability mutually compatible? Dan Fette thinks so. In association with the Denton Affordable Housing Corporation, he has built a subdivision of 14 single family homes, called Nevada Court.
 
Houses range in size from 1180 to 1620 SF with an average sales price of $135,000, and include features such as increased insulation in the walls and ceilings, radiant barrier in the roof decking, double vents in each room, on-demand water, dual flush toilets, and a rainwater harvesting system for landscape irrigation.

On a recent trip through a house at Nevada Court, a few members of the Dallas Alternative Energy meetup group questioned the price, suggesting that $135k seemed more middle income than ’affordable’–particularly for a house that was only 1340 SF. But Fette pointed out that the energy savings over time would offset the price of the house, saying “We’re anticipating energy and water use about half what a typical family would experience in this locale in a conventionally built home.”

He added, “In the energy efficiency category, we’re selling the houses with an energy use guarantee that the amount of electricity and natural gas necessary to comfortably heat and cool the houses stays below a particular amount. At today’s utliity prices that translates to less than $50/month for our 1340 SF model home.”

One key characteristic of green built homes is to seal the house well to reduce temperature leakage. The homes at Nevada court have R13 insulation in the walls and R50 in above the ceiling. All the duct work is run through air-conditioned space. Each room has two air ducts. One brings the air into the room and the other is a return duct to circulate air back to the AC system–making the rooms comfortable even when the doors are closed. He said that the system allows for a balanced flow, creating  neutral pressure in the house.

The spacing between the studs was increased but the house was wrapped in thermapoly with Dupont tyvek. A sealed house makes it even more important to have less toxic materials inside. (Many conventional homes have traditional flooring, carpets, paint and other materials that off-gas toxic chemicals over time.)

Another feature is the heating/cooling system. This house had a 1 1/2 ton AC unit. Fette said that often a house of this size might have a 2-3 ton unit because there is a tendency to over-size. However, when you put in too big an AC unit, the system hits its set point very quickly and it doesn’t run long enough to dehumidify. When there is less humidity, you can feel more comfortable at higher temperatures.

Each bathroom has a dual flush toilet, hot-water on demand, and efficient Delta shower heads. The dual flush toilets, purchased at Morris Supplies (on Regal Rd) have two buttons on top: one button uses more water to flush solid waste and the other uses less for liquid. 

Hot-water on demand is used to heat water the tap when you need it. Below shows the installation below a sink.

 

Water-efficient Delta shower heads are used in the bathrooms. However, these should not be confused with low-flow shower heads. Fette said: “Delta discovered that people don’t like the low flow shower heads, so they designed a large droplet size, but with fewer droplets.”

The rainwater harvesting system consists of a 1600 gallon tank that collects water from the gutter system along the room. It’s used exclusively to water the landscape, which is mostly Bermuda grass.

Fette isn’t new to green building. He had been the superintendent on the Zero Energy house built in Frisco. After that experience, his friends kept telling him: ‘When you build something the rest of us can afford, then come back and brag about it.’

He explained how he had run into Jane Burda Provo of the Denton Affordable Housing Corporation when they were attending a seminar at North Texas University. She had been working on trying to get low and moderate income people into existing renovated homes, and although they could often afford the mortgage payments, the utility costs were killing them. Fette’s solution has helped change that. 

For more information, you can reach Dan Fette at http://www.danfettebuilders.com.