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In This Issue...
November 16th Member Meeting
NO December SBC Meeting or Newsletter - Come Party with SBC
Cob Cottage Tour - Sunday, 11/20, 2:00 pm
Help Wanted for SBC Positions
New SBC Materials Column: Recycled Cotton Denim Insulation
10 Green Tips for the Season's Festivities
January 18th, 2006 Member Meeting
SBC
Calendar:
November 16th
Member Meeting at Casa de Luz
"A Hybrid House", Charles Gibson
December 2nd
SBC Holiday Party at Center for Maximum Potential Building Systems
January 18th, 2006
Member Meeting at Casa de Luz
"Green Building", Dick Pierce
January 20-22, 2006
Austin Green Living & Home Products Expo at the Convention Center
Local
Area Workshops:
Basics of PV (Photovoltaic) Systems
A free introductory talk will describe some typical systems designs,
AC versus DC systems, components, costs and typical Central Texas sunlight patterns. You can generate electricity
from the sun and reduce or eliminate your electric bill. Chip Wolfe of Meridian Solar will shed light on this valuable topic.
Presented Friday, December 2, 2005 from 6:30pm to 8:30pm at the Red Rock Community Center
114 Red Rock Road
Red Rock, Texas 78662
Call Marjory at 830-839-4077
SBC Workshops
Future SBC-sponsored workshops on cob, earth plaster and building with local juniper are in the works. Watch for upcoming announcements.
Other Workshops:
For light straw-clay events presented by Robert Laporte and/or Paula
Baker-Laporte:
- Dec 2-3, 2005 - Turning Your Dream into Reality Seminar, 2 days
- Feb 11-16, 2006 - EcoNest Workshop - Building for Health Naturally: How to Create an Authentic Home, 6 days
- April 10 - June 30 - EcoNest Apprenticeship Program, 12 weeks
- April 24-30 - EcoNest Builder Training, 7 days
- April 27-30 - EcoNest Hands-On Workshop, 4 days
- May 6-7 - EcoNest Seminar: Turning Your Dream into Reality, 2 days
All workshops are located in Santa Fe, NM. Contact: info@econest.com
Internship:
Black Range Lodge, Kingston, NM. Offers hands-on experience in natural building and permaculture projects.
Work-trade for lodging and meals, plus payment if warranted. Call 505-895-5652 or resources@StrawbaleCentral.com
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November 16th Member Meeting: "A Hybrid House" presented by Charles
Gibson
Drawing on his twenty years of experience with alternative building materials,
Charles Gibson has designed and is currently building a new home in Dripping Springs using several different green materials in strategic
ways. A combination of straw bale, Faswall and steel frame construction, his design utilizes the different materials in ways that maximize
their inherent benefits while minimizing labor and material costs. He calls his design a Hybrid House. Built using a high percentage of
green building materials at a moderate per-square-foot cost, the house qualifies for a conventional mortgage and meets International
Building Code 2000.
Mr. Gibson is owner of Rain Man Waterworks, an innovative rainwater
collection system construction business he began in 1992. Charles
has built over 125 residential rain systems in Austin and Central
Texas. He became a certified Permaculture designer in 1990 and
was a founding member of the Panhandle Permaculture Group. Charles
is a pioneer of straw bale construction in Texas and has been
involved in alternative building projects since 1988. He is a
former TDA certified organic grower and has been a coordinator
for the Sustainable Building Coalition. Charles is listed as an
installer for the City of Austin rainwater incentive program and
a member of the American Rainwater Catchment Systems Association.
He is a native Texan and lives much of what he has learned with
his wife and two daughters in Dripping Springs. He can be found
on the web at http://www.rainharvester.com and you can email him
at laurelr@earthlink.net.
Please
join
us for this informative presention by Charles.
SBC meets every 3rd Wednesday of the month at 7 pm at Casa
de Luz, 1701 Toomey Road in the Cielo Room. You are welcome
to join us before the meeting at 6 pm for a wonderful macrobiotic
meal at Casa de Luz.
NO December SBC Meeting or Newsletter - Come Party Instead!
The Sustainable Building Coalition/Strawbale Association of Texas and The Center for Maximum Potential Building Systems (928-4786)
invite you to celebrate the 2005 Holiday Season - evening of Saturday, December 2nd from 7 to 11 PM at Max’sPot 8604 FM 969
(just east of Hwy 183 over the railroad tracks on the left). Live Music will be provided by two great local bands. So come out,
laugh, have fun, dance and mingle with “green” company. Bring a community dish to share & BYOB and your own place setting
(plate, cup & utensils) Beer & non-alcoholic drinks provided.
Happy Holidays, Everyone!
Cob Cottage Tour - Sunday, November 20th, 2:00 pm
We invite you to join us for a visit to a charming thatched roof cob cottage in the Bastrop area. This lime-plastered cottage,
now owned by Shannon and Mike Shelton, was started by Mike Carter of CobCrew and is being completed by the current owners. The
beautiful thatched roof, featuring two towers, was done by professional African thatchers. The property also features a courtyard
with water feature, cob oven and partially completed cob tool shed.
Directions to tour site:
From Hwy 71 at the entrance to Austin-Bergstrom Airport, go 12.2 miles to Pope Bend Road (this is 2.7 miles past the huge Berdohl
Pecans sign on the left) and turn right. Pope Bend curves to the left. Continue to Simpson and turn right. Watch for cob tour signs.
If the weather is threatening or raining, please check the SBC website (www.greenbuilder.com/sbc) to verify that the tour will be held.
Call Gayle at 512-350-0001 if you need direction assistance the day of the tour.
HELP WANTED FOR SBC POSITIONS!
SBC Program Coordinator Needed:
Would you like to have a role in selecting program topics for our monthly meetings? We are seeking a volunteer to help with arranging
our monthly presentations. Among the duties are: Helping select program topics, contacting prospective speakers, making audio-visual
arrangements for the presentation, coordinating newsletter announcements of the presentations, and speaker "hosting" duties. While
other Coordinators are prepared to provide some assistance to the new Program Coordinator, knowledge of the local green building
community would be most helpful. Anyone interested in knowing more about this opportunity please contact
Gayle Borst, gayle@stewardshiparchitecture.com, 512-478-9033.
SBC website work:
- One time event (estimated time: 4 to 8hrs): updating our business member page with applicable information
SBC is an ALL volunteer organization. We do what we do because we believe in spreading the 'green' word!
Please do your small part so no one is overburdened. Thank you. Our coordinators meeting is the 1st Wed of each month
in the Casa de Luz restaurant 6-8pm. Come whenever you can - every little bit helps!
"IF you think YOU'RE TOO SMALL to be EFFECTIVE you have NEVER BEEN IN BED with a MOSQUITO" quote by Bette Reese
New SBC Materials Column: Recycled Cotton Denim Insulation
Hello all, and welcome to the new SBC Materials Column! Each issue
I’ll be reviewing a different green building material - how it’s used, why it’s green, where it comes from, and where to
get more information – and I hope to hear your suggestions, questions and comments so that the Column can be a relevant
and interactive learning experience for each of us. (email, meganann@mail.utexas.edu)
Winter is almost here in Austin, though our recent forecasts might
fool you, and I thought we should kick off the Column with a look at recycled cotton denim insulation, which has
received a great deal of attention in green building circles. The primary manufacturer and distributor, Bonded Logic,
LLC of Chandler, AZ, entered into a partnership with the Polo Jeans Company to collect and recycle blue jeans into healthy, efficient insulation. Their UltraTouch Natural Cotton
Fiber product uses 85% post-industrial denim treated with borates, a fire retardant, which also acts as an inhibitor
to pests, mold and mildew. Borate, often called boric acid, is a mixture of borax and boron-containing salts that
does not evaporate or become volatile when in contact with oxygen, and is considered non-carcinogenic.(www.beyondpesticides.org)
One of the key selling points is that the product does not itch, and can be installed without protective clothing. I have
had the opportunity to work with the product, and can attest to the labor safety – we kept scrap in our studios for naptime!
Now that we’ve established the material health, let’s take a closer look at how it performs.
UltraTouch has an R-value of 3.45-3.71 per inch, dependant upon thickness, making it a more efficient alternative to fiberglass (2.10-2.70 R/inch) and
a competitor with spray-in cellulose (3.00-3.75 R/inch).(www.askthebuilder.com) The borate
treatment enables the product to achieve a Class-A fire rating, meaning it provides 60 minutes of fire resistance, which is also competitive with both
fiberglass (Class-A) and treated spray-in cellulose (Class-A). And, although many of us may be less concerned with acoustical
performance, it achieves a Noise Reduction Coefficient (NRC) of 1.15 and an overall Sound Transmission Class (STC) rating of 45,
meaning that music and loud voices may be audible.
And lastly,
what are some additional benefits? On a national level, UltraTouch
is eligible for a number of LEED points: Energy & Atmosphere Credit
1 (Optimize Energy Performance), Materials & Resources Credit
4 (Recycled Content), Materials & Resources Credit 6 (Rapidly
Renewable Materials), and Indoor Environmental Air Quality Credit
4 (Low Emitting Materials). On a local level, the product is eligible
for points in the Austin Residential Green Building Program: Energy
Efficiency, Materials Efficiency, and Health & Safety. Unfortunately,
the product does not qualify as a local resource by any standard,
but it is available from Ecowise (326-4474) and the Environmental Depot (288-6161). Their websites can be found on our
Business Members page. Also, Enercheck Insulation, Inc.
(282-2288) is a local installer. For more information about this product, visit Bonded
Logic, LLC at www.bondedlogic.com. For more information about all types of green building products, call Austin Green Energy Program at 482-5300.
I look forward to your suggestions – in the meantime, have a warm and happy November!
10 Green Tips for the Season's Festivities
Source: Organic Consumers Association (www.organicconsumers.org)
- Purchase organic and Fair Trade foods for holiday meals.
- Avoid toxic PVC and excessive packaging in the gifts you buy.
- Use reusable gift wrap instead of paper, like fabric or gift boxes.
- Fashion over energy consumption: Turn down the heat and put on a sweater.
- Consider the types of businesses you are supporting when you are shopping.
- 'Tis the season for giving: Volunteer some time for your favorite cause.
- Put your holiday lights on a timer to save energy. Have them on only when you can really appreciate them.
- Try a living potted Christmas tree (plant it outside in the spring). Or arrange some pruned branches, instead of chopping down a tree.
- Your favorite charity will do more for the planet with your money than a new holiday outfit will. Donate!
- Humans are part of the environment too, and so being kind to the environment also means being kind to each other.
Love is contagious, so pass it around.
January 18th Member Meeting: "Green Building" presented by Dick Pierce
A lot of us want to live more sustainably, use more renewables from local sources, use lots less energy and water, bring
back the soil, grow food/have gardens, and honor and assist Nature. And many of us will have to/want to live in a regular
looking house, on a lot, in a neighborhood, in a town/city with rules, codes, inspectors and C/Os, need to have a mortgage
(and then an equity line for college educations, etc.), and/or sell someday to someone else who has these same needs.
Building Green, remodeling Green, living Green, especially in Austin, TX, can accomplish nearly all of the above.
Dick's presentation puts a lot of separate pieces together and highlights the simpler/less expensive items that we can
all do whether we are building, remodeling, or maintaining. Come on and hear if you don't know it. Come on and cheer
if you do know it.
Dick Pierce is a 7-year Austinite, major fan of the SBC and its Membership, and a passionate about each citizen doing the
max to make Austin "greener" (buildings, trees, vegetables, beer), and more sustainable. He is a Master Gardener, Master
Naturalist, Permaculture teacher, and has a Certificate in Landscape Design. He has the fortune of representing the staff
and young people at American YouthWorks' Casa Verde Builders(CVB), who, according to him/them, are the most devoted Green
Builders in town, with several 5-STAR homes. Also, SBC founding member, Gayle Borst, has been CVB's award-winning Architect.
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