Comment 43001

By Undustrial (registered) - website | Posted July 09, 2010 at 02:30:12

I read an interesting quote the other day in the midst of a bunch of energy research. To paraphrase, the author basically pointed out that in the last 30 years buildings have become the leading energy user in our society. But we already knew far more than enough about green building by 1980 to have cut this down to a small fraction of what it was then". Unfortunately, I've gone through way too many hours of research in the last few days to remember where it came from, but the point is very valid. Nearly every book I have, or have even seen, on technologies like passive solar design were printed in the 70s.

The "amazing advances in construction" we've seen since WWII have been much more a case of externalizing costs (to home owners and the environment) than any real "progress" in the technologies themselves. New homes breaking down in three decades? I can believe it, but mostly because I've heard enough stories of families having to rebuild half their fancy new Ancaster homes themselves in the first five years.

"Today, the notion of progress in a single line without goal or limit seems perhaps the most parochial notion of a very parochial century." — Lewis Mumford

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