The latest generation of air source heat pumps and falling costs of solar electric panels have lead many homeowners and businesses to combine these technologies to heat and cool their buildings using free energy from the sun. Also known as Heat Pump Solar Space Heating, this method is growing in popularity. Once such business is [...]
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Have you ever wondered what can be done in landscaping to reflect the work you’ve put into making your home green? In most cases, having a Green Home is about the building or retrofitting process, the materials used and the structures energy efficiency once completed, but what about outside the doorway? Lessening our impact on [...]
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As part of their web video series The Solar Road Tour, local full-service solar installer ReVision Energy put together this video of a near net-zero apartment building in Portland, Maine. This 3-unit downtown apartment building – located in the heart of Portland, Maine’s East End – features air source heat pump (ASHP) heating, solar thermal [...]
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In renovating our old house on the East End, we sought out eco-friendly products and materials, like low-VOC finishes, spray-foam insulation with a high R-value, and locally milled wood for our floors. But we didn’t get the chance to use any reclaimed materials (even though we tried, with several visits to the Habitat ReStore.). When [...]
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Scottish Power Renewables has successfully installed the world’s first tidal energy turbine near the island of Eday, one of Orkney’s northern isles. A 100′ tall HS1000 tidal turbine developed by Andritz Hdyro Hammerfest is producing power for more than 500 homes and businesses already, and more are scheduled for installation to complete the tidal energy farm. From [...]
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Triple glazed windows have usually garnered a price tag only palatable by the top 1%. This cost dilemma has made choosing triple pane windows seem almost painful and for this reason many in the past have chosen to stick with double glazing. The argument strongly reasoned that the extra cost for triple glazed windows had [...]
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When most people hear the words “green home” they mostly think of new construction, super-insulated homes. But what about all the homes that are already standing, some for more than a century? In our opinion it’s where the true advancements in energy efficiency can be made, not to mention the potential for starting a wildfire [...]
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Ocean Renewable Power Company of Portland, Maine is set to start construction of it first Tidal Energy System in Cobscook Bay later this month. Securing a federal permit to install Maine’s first go at tidal energy, the project is scheduled to begin mid-month and be online by summer. This first for Maine is a broad leap forward [...]
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Jake Staub and Sonia Barrantes, two veteran former U.S. Navy Test Pilots in Portland, and Chris Corson, of EcoCor Design/Build in Belfast, have embarked on Portland’s first Passive House journey set to break ground in Spring 2012. Partners Jake Staub, formerly of Addison, Illinois, and Sonia Barrantes, formerly of Scarborough, Maine, recently left the Navy in order [...]
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Semprius, a startup company based in Durham, North Carolina, has announced it’s new concentrated solar panel achieves 33.9% efficiency.Semprius’s solar cells use gallium arsenide, rather than silicon, which is able to absorb sunlight and dissipate heat far better. The solar panel that scored this major efficiency record is made up of hundreds of these tiny [...]
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