When Its Mood Is Green, So Are You
The New York Times featured an article about the Bright Built Barn, a net-zero home where we installed the renewable energy systems.
Steven Kurutz writes:
Most homeowners have a general sense of whether or not they are being energy efficient, a hunch confirmed or disproved when the monthly bills arrive. But occupants of a prefabricated house designed by Kaplan Thompson Architects, a firm in Portland, Me., will receive real-time feedback through a system Phil Kaplan, one of the architects, describes as “an update on the mood ring.”
The super-insulated, solar-heated BrightBuilt Barn is equipped with a device that analyzes electricity use and communicates that data to a skirt of LEDs affixed to the base of the home’s exterior. If the house is on track to create more energy than it uses, the lights turn green; yellow is a borderline condition, and red means the owners should shut off appliances or turn down the heat.
