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The March, 2025 issue of Green Energy Times has gone to press. It will be available at the usual outlets soon.
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Headline News:
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For more news, please visit geoharvey – Daily News about Energy and Climate Change. Tackling Climate Change and Threats to Our Republic Republican and democrat mascots representing how each party is pushing against the other. (AdobeStock_736873512) Dr. Beth Malow and Bruce Morlan The United States, like much of the world, is confronting two colossal, interwoven challenges. On one hand, we are grappling with the increasingly urgent threat of climate change — a force capable of destabilizing our ecosystem, economy, and way of life. On the other hand, threats to our republic are on the rise both at home and abroad, weakening the very political system we rely on to address such global crises. At a moment when visionary, effective leadership is needed more than ever to confront climate change, our political system is consumed by partisan gridlock and dysfunction. This state of affairs is untenable. To tackle these twin challenges, we need to write a new script, one that embraces the logic of bipartisanship. We, the authors here, are from opposite political camps. Our political peers have very different views of these issues and the conversations we have within our respective political groups barely acknowledge any common ground. “Conflict entrepreneurs,” a term coined by author Amanda Ripley, describes those driven to stir up conflict for economic or other motives. And extremists in our groups ensure that any efforts to find shared solutions are quickly labeled as “compromise” (now a four-letter word in politics) or as outright surrender. But we recognize that merely working within our peer groups will not create lasting policies. We must maintain respectful and meaningful conversations with all stakeholders to ensure that our compromises are more enduring than purely partisan solutions can ever be. One of the fundamental shortcomings of the U.S. environmental movement is its failure to build a truly bipartisan coalition. To date, less than 1% of climate philanthropy has flowed to right-of-center organizing and advocacy, even though a significant portion of the American public identifies as “conservative” or Republican. The practical result is that the environmental movement has become more partisan than the society it seeks to serve. This dynamic not only limits the climate movement’s reach but also misses an opportunity to create a broad-based, bipartisan mandate for action — a political necessity if we are to address the climate crisis at the necessary scale, speed and political durability. This is a problem we can fix. At its heart, democracy is about persuasion — about talking to our fellow citizens, winning hearts and minds, and building common ground. That same principle applies to climate action. We need to engage more of our fellow citizens in the cause of protecting our shared environment, including those who may not traditionally align with environmental causes. Polling shows that while roughly two-thirds of Americans are worried about climate change, a similar percentage rarely or never discuss the issue with family and friends. There is an untapped well of potential support for climate action, and it crosses party lines. Polarization is actively used to keep us divided by sowing fear, uncertainty and doubts about any attempts to create a shared reality with shared solutions. Many Americans, particularly young people, are losing faith in the ability of our nation to deliver on the issues they care about most. Yet climate action offers a unique opportunity to restore that faith. What better way to renew hope in the American political system than by showing it can tackle climate change — an issue young people rank as one of their top concerns — through bipartisan cooperation? Republican lawmakers, in particular, have expressed a desire for a stronger mandate from their constituents for climate action. These lawmakers are constrained by a perceived lack of support for climate solutions within their base, who are often driven by conflict entrepreneurs. By investing in right-of-center organizing, we can help create the conditions for these lawmakers to step forward on climate action without fear of reprisal. This strategy not only benefits the environment but also reinvigorates our democracy by encouraging a more responsive and effective legislative system. At its core, democracy is about active participation, dialogue, and shared responsibility. Climate change presents an unparalleled opportunity to bring people together in defense of a common cause: the preservation of the planet we all call home. In this way, climate action, far from being a casualty of democracy’s dysfunction, can become a catalyst for its renewal. The same strategies that can unite the country in addressing environmental decay can also reverse the trends of democratic decay. In the end, the fight against climate change and the fight for a stronger republic are not separate battles but interconnected struggles that require similar solutions: engagement, dialogue, and consensus-building. With smart strategy and civil society investments, we can create a healthier planet and a more functional political system in the process. The stakes are too high to continue business as usual. We must take a new approach — one where climate action and democratic renewal go hand in hand, securing a brighter future for generations to come.  High Street Passive House. (Images: Wright Construction) Greg and Barb Whitchurch If you want to shop around to design a beautiful new home, visit Patricia Chen’s website, www.PC-Architecture.com/. Chen, the architect of High Street House in southern Vermont, is also the owner of this three-story, all-electric, super-comfortable and high-performance home. To realize her plan, she picked a verified standard of building, and then chose Wright Construction of Mt. Holly, VT (www.WrightConstruction.com) to make it all happen. The home is a certified Passive House (PH) (www.bit.ly/phius-highstreet). It exemplifies the core principle of PH: meticulous attention to detail – executing the fundamental elements of construction with precision, and focusing on energy efficiency and durability at every stage. Chen is a Certified Passive House Consultant (CPHC) herself, and this is her first PH. To meet the PH standard of quality and efficiency, she outfitted the house with a Rheem heat pump water heater, a GE whole-house heat pump for heating and cooling, RenewAire ventilation for constant filtered fresh air, and Alpen triple-pane windows and doors. For years, PH construction has been portrayed as an expensive ideal, shrouded in complexity. Builders sometimes shy away, citing concerns about the rigorous standards and oversight. But the truth is PH is not magic; it is simply good building. And projects like High Street House demonstrate just how attainable it can be. The PH standard is independent of style or interior design needs. Joe Poston of Wright Construction, the builder, shared his experience, “This was our first PH, and the biggest difference between a PH and a regular house just comes down to details, air sealing, and a lot more insulation.” (www.bit.ly/ph-90). So, why the hesitation among some builders? Poston confessed to initial anxieties. “I was … concerned about completing the project and not meeting the required goals,” he said. This fear of the unknown is understandable. PH construction involves a learning curve, a shift in mindset from run-of-the-mill practices. However, as Poston discovered, PH is far from daunting, “The process is much more straightforward than I imagined. There are checks along the way to make sure we are headed in the right direction and haven’t gone too far down a road of building-in problems that could cause a failure. Now that we have completed one, I wouldn’t shy away from doing it again.”  Well-insulated foundation sealed with Stego air and moisture barrier. The oversight is another common concern: third-party experts representing the owner oversee the design and construction. “It is both a nuisance and a blessing at the same time,” Poston explains. “Yes, we don’t like having someone looking over our shoulder while we work, but the rater we worked with was helpful in pointing out areas that are problematic, so we knew where to be extra careful on assembly.” One can see how this conflicts with the current accepted practice of ‘Lowest bid, cheap materials. Get ‘er done. On to the next project!’ Our homes deserve more integrity and care than that. Constructive oversight is a valuable piece, acting as a safeguard for both the builder and the owner. Just as we rely on organizations like UL, C-E, Energy Star and NHTSA to certify the safety and performance of our appliances and cars, our homes deserve independent oversight. Having an internationally recognized authority like PHIUS (www.PHIUS.org/) standing behind a home’s certification ensures the value of the homeowner’s investment. PH is not at the end of some continuum of bespoke quality and excessive efficiency. It is dead center of price point, offering the most bang for your buck, maximizing payback and ROI (return on investment), and avoiding the trap of doing less at first and paying higher utility bills forever. There are already several hundred Certified Passive House building professionals serving New England. And, there are several tens of thousands of PH buildings: homes, apartment buildings, recreation centers, university dorms, high-rise office buildings, prisons, hospitals, clinics, resorts, and more built to this standard worldwide. Some jurisdictions around the world, even in the U.S., are making PH a standard in their building codes. It simply makes sense to build well, save on operational costs and maintenance, and make occupants more comfortable, healthy, and happy. (The filtered air inside a PH is much safer and fresher than the air outside.) PH is not about exotic new materials, but rather employing the better materials already on the local markets. Instead of using standard house wraps, more robust and “smarter” membranes are preferred. Instead of conventional hydrocarbon-based tapes and caulks, acrylic-based products are recommended for their superior performance and longevity. Insulation values are chosen with calculations based on science and engineering principles, focusing on the specific climate zone. PH also considers the solar orientation of the building and its windows, so that solar gain in the winter and shading in the summer can inform the insulation specifications. PH construction offers another significant benefit: resilience. These homes withstand extreme weather events and power outages, protecting the occupants within a secure envelope, thereby putting less strain on community emergency shelters and other resources during disasters – one reason municipalities are embracing PH. The initial investment for a PH-quality home is typically 3-5% higher than conventional construction. However, this upfront cost is quickly recovered through significant energy savings. From day one, homeowners with mortgages pay a slightly higher mortgage but much lower monthly utility bills, adding up to immediate savings. These financial benefits, coupled with enhanced comfort, health, and environmental benefits, make PH a compelling choice. For these authors, the most crucial element of our own PH construction was the third-party consultation and verification. This provided important engineering input; ensured that the builder met the standards; and delivered a truly high-performance home. Finding a builder and designer who welcomed this collaboration was essential (www.bit.ly/vtph-phc). PH is not a mystical, expensive endeavor; it is a practical, affordable, science-based process. Any builder can build to the PH standard. It is time to dispel the myths (www.bit.ly/eb-ph-myths) and embrace the reality: PH is a smart investment – for the owner, the occupants, and the community. The Whitchurches’ current PH is pictured in the Montpelier Construction ad on page 28; they are designing a net-positive, aging-in-place PH for themselves using environmentally responsible materials www.bit.ly/get-w-build. B  Worried mother looking at her little son holdin an inhaler to treat an asthma attack. (AdobeStock_481000619) arb and Greg Whitchurch Links are clickable in the online edition We have built a world of remarkable convenience, a world where almost-instant gratification is often just a click away. But this progress has a dark side: pollution. It is not just about overflowing landfills or smog-choked cities; it is about the air we breathe, the water we drink, the food we eat, and the increasingly volatile climate that shapes our lives. Arnold Schwarzenegger (world champion bodybuilder, movie star, and former Governor of California) has been one of the few Republican champions of climate action (www.bit.ly/ct-arnold-cc). Schwarzenegger told CBS News, “As long as they keep talking about global climate change, they are not gonna go anywhere, because no one gives a s–t about that.” “Climate change” can sound distant and abstract, but “pollution” is visceral, immediate, and terrifying. Because pollution is not just about the future; it is about the cancers, breathing problems, and extreme weather events impacting your life right now. We are Exhausted! Pollution’s Pervasive Reach From the exhaust fumes of our cars to the smoke billowing from our bonfires and BBQs, and from the emissions of factories to the invisible byproducts of cooking and heating in our homes, the common thread is combustion. We keep on burning stuff. This exhaust, the lifeblood of our modern world, is also our poison. It contaminates the air we breathe (www.bit.ly/who-air-poll), the rivers and oceans that sustain us, the groundwater we drink, and the very soil in which we grow our crops. Air pollution fuels climate change, leading to more frequent and intense weather disasters, from floods and wildfires to droughts and heatwaves. Here in New England, we now have ticks and Lyme disease, ash tree borers, and worse – as invasives become indigenous. We have been “soiling our nest” and getting away with it for a long time now. Using our rivers and streams as sewers went on for too long before we admitted that something had to be done. A related example. We used to warn people about smoking in the house, in the car, around kids – to little effect. After many decades and government action, the message seems to have sunk in, mostly. But it has been aided by personal experiences of asthma, emphysema, COPD and lung cancer (www.bit.ly/nejm-cc-ff-children). However, now many people insist on using gas ranges in spite of warnings, and are injuring themselves and their families with the toxic fumes. The most dangerous fumes have no odor, and range hoods are not a solution: if you can smell the bacon, you are breathing the poisons, too (www.bit.ly/yt-gaslighting ). The excuses people use to justify this behavior are not very different than those used by smokers long ago (www.bit.ly/get-snell). Another example. Our house is in Middlesex, Vermont, eight miles from the Capitol building in Montpelier. Both towns have experienced “100 year” flooding for the past two years. The Town had not yet completed road damage repairs from 2023 when the 2024 storm hit. The Great Brook next to our road overflowed, washing out sections of the road, destroying bridges, yards and driveways, felling trees, and filling basements with mud. For most of the past two summers and falls we have lived with the sound of huge machines repairing the road and the stream banks. But those machines created so much more pollution (many of them left running even while not in use), that one resident posted a sign that read, “Pollution caused this disaster, so if you’re stopping by to gawk at the devastation, at least turn your engine off.” A Choice We Can No Longer Avoid: Is “Maybe Later” Still Our Answer?  Cartoon by Leah Wittenberg. View more of her work at A piece of good news is that most of this pollution is avoidable. We have the technology, the knowledge, and the resources to transition to cleaner, more sustainable ways of living. Renewable energy sources, sustainable agriculture practices, electric vehicles and equipment are all readily available, offering viable alternatives to our current polluting habits. Making these changes requires a shift in mindset and a little effort. We should challenge our personal status quo and embrace new technologies and practices. And yes, it often comes with a price tag, at least in the short term. (The money comes back eventually, but the benefits of safety, comfort, health and reliability are immediate.) So, the question becomes: is it worth it? The answer is a resounding “Yes.” The cost of inaction is — already has been! — far greater. The cost of polluted air, contaminated water, and a destabilized climate is measured in human lives, economic losses, and the irreversible damage to our planet. We can no longer afford to prioritize short-term convenience over long-term sustainability (www.bit.ly/ct-poll-scam). Taking Action: From Awareness to Advocacy So, what can we do? How can we move from recognizing the problem to actively participating in the solution?
We are at a crossroads. We can continue down the path of environmental degradation, or we can choose a better future. However, not taking a stand is, in effect, choosing to continue polluting – which is how we got here in the first place (www.bit.ly/get-w-culpa). As Schwarzenegger reminds us, we need to shift our focus from the abstract concept of climate change to the very real and immediate threat of pollution. Because pollution is not just about the planet; it is about our personal health, our communities, and our future. And that’s something we can all understand (www.bit.ly/lrb-climate-break). The Whitchurches own a Passive House with solar PV, drive EVs, and use battery-operated tools and equipment. They are frequent contributors to this publication. |
Sustainability Symposium 2025: A Force of Nature
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