Posts Tagged ‘mechanical’
Sustainability in Florida
[caption id="attachment_31" align="alignright" width="112" caption="Guy Van Meulebrouck"][/caption] The heart of Florida's geothermal treasure is it's huge aquifer system. As contractors and engineers progressively tap more and more into the aquifer a question arises-will the aquifer heat up through time? Environmental concerns is the topic. I had a few thoughts on this subject. I will blog the rest of my ideas in coming days. First of all, any heat that goes into the aquifer as a result of geothermal would otherwise go into the atmosphere at a higher rate (since geothermal draws less electric per BTU of cooling than air source equipment). HVAC (Heating Ventilating and Air Conditioning) is what allowed Florida to grow to it's present population and air conditioning will not go away in Florida. This argument looks at the planet as the control area and asks what proof is there that a slightly warmer aquifer is tragic compared to a warmer atmosphere? Looking at the whole pictue will take several blogs. Tune in for more and feel free to let me know your thoughts and research on the subject.
new possibilities for geothermal
Last year, Obama has sent over $168,000,000 to Florida governments to be used for energy reduction. This program is called EECBG . Each city and county was allocated a percentage of this based on population and was instructed to find a way to spend this money on reducing energy. Each government has to prove that whatever the money got spent on actually reduced energy bills, and was instructed to buy American in the process. Throughout this year, the fruits of this endeavor should be coming to light as construction projects and/or incentive programs. One easy way a local government can gauge the potential for energy savings is to require Energy Star products and systems, of which geothermal is one. This builds upon a program already established by the Department of Energy. http://www.energystar.gov/index.cfm?c=tax_credits.tx_index There are architectural improvements that are listed for federal Energy Star tax credits too. It is worth a visit to this website since there is still time to get federal tax credits for any residential or commercial improvements made in 2009.
