Construction debris can make up over a quarter of a landfill. Here are some tips for reducing construction waste from our recent remodeling project.

We have covered donating unwanted items in the past.  Craigslist proved very useful in giving away old kitchen cabinets, countertops, extra wood, and many other items.  We also moved into our garage for much more organized storage.

Our contractor was instrumental in diverting old items toward for use on other projects he was working on. Many items went to a local church.

We were left with extra construction supplies such as adhesives and sealers, parts, etc. We returned as many as we could to vendors and gave the extras back to our contractor for future projects.  No sense in adding stuff that would never be used to our storage space.

You will not save money even if you use CFLs, when lights are left on for no reason.  With our recent remodel, we installed several light switches that automatically turn off. These are required by California’s Title 22 code.

Vacancy sensors detect when a space becomes vacant and turn lighting off automatically after a preset time delay elapses.  They also make other specialized versions that have fixed 5 minutes delays, good for closets.

These switches replace standard light switches, so they can be easily retrofitted.  Most cost under $50.

By now, hopefully everyone knows why we should switch to CFLs. We have covered this area in the past.

Environmental Working Group has a new research which identified 7 bulb lines from Earthmate, Litetronics, Sylvania, Feit, MaxLite, and Philips that last a long time and have very little mercury.  Look for these when you are shopping.

Also a reminder that these bulbs are very delicate.  Transport them with care.  We have recently broken 2 CFL bulbs ourselves.

We all have power supplies littered with little power bricks.  These wall warts can constantly jack up your power bill, even when items are not in use, hence the term vampire or phantom power use. Lawrence Berkley National Labs estimates that 10% of residential power use is wasted toward this.  Older power bricks are also not very efficient in converting AC power to DC power, causing waste.

We haveve covered power use by technology products in the past, including use of a Kill a watt to measure power consumption.   Yes, just unplugging them or turning off the power strip they are plugged into will work.

New devices now come with power saving power bricks that were required July 1, 2006 by the California’s California Energy Commission or CEC regulation, as well as the federal government’s Energy Independence and Security Act of July 1, 2008.

You should see an “Efficiency Level IV” tag on the brick that have very low “no load power consumption”.  You could even replace old power supplies with these newer ones.  They should draw a maximum of 0.75 watts when in No Load mode.  Energy Star 1.1 requires minimum power efficiency of 80%, while a future 2.0 version will up it to 87%.

San Francisco readers: WETA has a free open house aboard the new eco friendly Gemini Ferry on Friday, December 12 1:30-330pm at the San Francisco Ferry Building. It runs on a bio diesel blend, is 85% cleaner than EPA emission standards, uses solar technology, etc..