Championing the
Changemakers

If you're one of the many people becoming... Read more

I have been having a lot of fun feeding worms my garbage. We have something you could either call a "worm bin" or a "home vermicomposting system," and we throw our food scraps, banana peels, melon rinds, moldy bread--you name it--into that. There are a couple pounds of worms in the bin, and they gratefully accept the waste, eat it,... Read more

We are already adding blankets to our beds here in Vermont, and it's still dark when my husband and I get up for our early-morning run. Looks like time to wean the kids off their late-to-bed/late-to-rise schedule and remember... Read more

Home unimprovement, noun. During renovation, the removal from a building of misguided features or home "improvements" added during previous renovations.

It's always satisfying to see a name given to a phenomenon that you already know well, and that is... Read more

As I was hosing down the dirt driveway in front of my house last week to keep the dust down with some guests due to arrive, I got to thinking about Chicken Dinner Road.

I once lived in Canyon County, Idaho and often passed a junction for Chicken Dinner Road. Some years ago, I was told, this road was a dusty dirt track traveling... Read more

I called Pete Samaras, Senior Electrical Estimator at DPR Construction, to ask him about job-site lighting practices for our product review on LED jobsite lighting  (see LED Systems Provide Huge Energy Savings for Jobsite Lighting, EBN Aug. 2011 and our GreenSpec listing of the Flex SLS system). To make sure he had the latest... Read more

Try this little perceptual experiment now: look at yourself in a mirror (or your computer or phone camera). Then look at your left eye, and then your right eye, and then back and forth several times. What do you see?

If someone else is around, ask them to look at you, and look back and forth between your eyes.

What... Read more

After a long summer of too much rain followed by too much heat, I... Read more

A few weeks ago I told a story in this space that was third-hand from Gordon Hayward. Well, a lot changed in the telling, and Gordon got back to me with what really happened.

Three aunts of a young man from Dorchester, Mass., came up to celebrate his graduation from a Vermont boarding school. They asked Gordon how anyone... Read more

Most of us approach poorly performing old windows with a step-by-step exploration from one less-than-optimal fix to the next. Improving existing window performance shouldn't be that way, and it doesn't have to with new online... Read more

Once upon a time in a village there lived a wise old man. Legend had it that he could answer any question posed to him. A village boy hatched a plan to fool him. He caught a small bird, and approaching the wise old man with the bird in his hands, he asked, "Is this bird dead or alive?"  If the man said it was alive, the boy would... Read more

[Editor's note: This the tenth and final piece in a set of reflections by Vermont builder Robert Riversong. Links to the other nine... Read more

As an insulation product, spray polyurethane foam (SPF) has many great attributes that we've talked about on this website: easy installation in irregular locations, air barrier qualities, and moisture management potential. Our publications and blog have also been active in covering some of the downsides of this product, including toxic... Read more

Poetry used to be memorized, not written down, and handed from bard to bard, memory to memory, down through the generations. Perhaps folks out there have memorized poems back when schools taught such things, or for personal interest.

Not counting things I have written, I know only one poem by memory, written by David McCord. As proof,... Read more

Vinyl flooring is inexpensive, which has made it one of the most popular commercial flooring options, but it contains phthalates and other... Read more

There's already been a lot of excellent debate around the new LEED Pilot Credit 43. I find myself agreeing with both sides! Here's where I stand in what may be the eye of the storm.

On the one hand, LEED is fundamentally supposed to be about designing high-performing... Read more

[Editor's note: Robert Riversong, a Vermont builder, continues his 10-part series of articles taking... Read more

[Editor's note: Robert Riversong, a Vermont builder, continues his 10-part series of articles taking design and... Read more