Our friend Doug recently bought a heat pump water heater and decided to save a good amount of money by installing it himself. We gave him a hand with the installation and were surprised at how relatively easy it was.
Melbourne, Australia is a healthy city. Active streets with less car dependence, lots of mass transit and pedestrians. Photo by Naomi Cole.
Mass transit doesn’t have a lot of cheerleaders. People love their cars, despite the harm they cause us, but who loves their bus? And who sees transit as a vital decarbonization strategy when electric vehicles steal the spotlight? Yet people who ride transit emit significantly less CO2 than people who … [continued]
We are huge electric vehicle fans and have written many, many, many articles about why we love them in our series, Decarbonize Your Life. But cars, even electric ones, are harmful to people and communities. The psychologist Carl Jung said everything has a “shadow” or dark side, and in this … [continued]
Once you’re ready to drive electric (we hope we helped convince you in our last post), you’ll have to determine how and where to charge your new electric ride. 80% of charging happens at home and 20% at destination and fast chargers, which are essential for road trips. Today we’ll … [continued]
It wasn’t until our first daughter could no longer comfortably fit in her portable infant car seat that we decided we needed our own car. Until then, at ages 33 and 35, we had managed to live a fulfilled and happy car-free life and save thousands of dollars a year. … [continued]
With winter weather in full force across the US, many of us are wondering if we can really heat our homes in frigid temperatures without burning fossil fuels. In the fall of 2021, we had the same question. The 35-year-old gas furnace at our family’s duplex in Cleveland, Ohio, was … [continued]
The electric fireplace at the center of our living room creates a lovely ambiance. The ductless heat pump (upper left) efficiently provides the heat to keep us warm.
Humans have a primal attraction to a crackling flame and the ambience of a cozy fireplace. Architect Frank Lloyd Wright called the hearth the “the psychological center of the home,” and designed all his residences around a central fireplace. For the majority of humans who now live in urban areas, … [continued]
The 120-volt plug-in heat pump water heater allows homeowners to easily plug a highly efficient water heater into a standard outlet. This is transformational because it allows the 60 million U.S. homes with gas water heaters to easily and cheaply transition to a clean, efficient, cost saving heat pump option. … [continued]
Heat pump water heaters are efficient, money-saving, decarbonizing machines. They use a fraction of the energy of the old-school technologies they replace without any compromise in performance. They offer lower utility bills, reduced carbon emissions, and dehumidification! The word is now out, and sales are taking off with new rebates, … [continued]
A common critique of the “electrify everything” movement is that it will be near impossible to produce enough clean electricity to replace the fossil fuels used in buildings and transportation and make sure the grid is strong enough to deliver it. While this concern is valid, there is an important … [continued]
