I’m just a humble guy trying to do my part – however small – to make my house as energy efficient and green as I can. Meaning, when I can afford the time and money. But a lot of Boulder folk are going whole grass-fed hog. (Witness the Solar Harvest House, of which I blogged some time ago.) I’d like to start featuring some of these houses and their owners, both to show you what’s possible when going green, and to give myself some swell ideas for the future of my own place.
To lead off the series, here’s a bit of the solar work my friend Dave’s been up to at his place. I’ll give you the 25-cent tour today, with a longer discussion with Dave on Thursday. More of these little profiles should pop up once a month or so; do let me know how you like them.


Interests: Horseback riding, watching the silence of the snow, obviously anything creative, cooking
Inspiration: Like most of you, when I heard of recycling to save the earth, I naturally assumed I needed to separate my plastics, newspapers and glass. I was helping. That was all I needed to do. Then one day, I was searching around for something fun, some art, and I came across this abstract piece. It was gorgeous - it looked like a naturally formed wave of icy white water bursting into the air. When I looked closer at it, I saw that it was made from recycled plastic caps. I was in shock. What kind of imagination and talent does that take to look at a plastic cap and see more to it then what it actually is? How can someone be so ingenious that they can take something that we normally throw away and create such a piece of beauty with it? This is the thought process that I could not stop pondering and it took over my mind, body and soul and soon enough became my muse.
I began Earth's Journey for this reason. I wanted to show the world that there was more to saving the earth than just recycling. There is beauty in things we can't even imagine, and so many ways to help our planet flourish. There are products out there that we all could use to completely decorate, furnish and run a home... all environmentally safe. You can buy organic bedding, non-toxic cleaning detergents, solar power, or make a change in a small way by using energy-efficient light bulbs. But the best part of recycling and being eco-friendly is the beauty that you'll find here, with all of our different artisans. As you can see I'm very passionate about this type of artistic creativity, and I hope you will be too.
I invite you to sit back, relax and ... Be Inspired by Green!
Always champing at the bit, Jed. I'll get to those sorts of things on Thursday with a more text-basedtalk with Dave.
Vicki: While I'm pretty sure he didn't do any of the physical labor, he did put togehter much of the package. Dave's a former fellow at the Rocky Mountain Institute, so he knows his green.
Please pass on to him how great his home looks. If it functions as good as it looks then he should go into another line of work- green home consultant. But I too would be interested to know the cost of something like that.
Did he build the home himself or did he renovate an existing one?