Saturday, October 11, 2008

The Greening of Quaker House


At Quaker House, we’re an outpost of peace witness, not an environmental demonstration project. But in all the repairs and renovations of the past few years, we’ve tried to do our bit to moderate our carbon footprint. Here are some of the changes we’ve made:


– In 2003, when we had to replace our HVAC system, we paid extra to get a system rated at 93 per cent efficiency.
– In 2007 the old water heater went kaput, and we replaced it with a tankless model, which saves energy and water. It turned out to be one of the first tankless heaters installed in the city!
– All but a few of our incandescent light bulbs have been replaced with low-energy flourescents.
– Our new toilets are low-water usage types.
–We installed more storm windows and beefed up the insulation in our attic, to save energy in both summer and winter.

As we said, our main mission here is peace work. And while none of this is radical, we think the combination is significant. And we’ll be watching for other ways to enhance this effort.

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