Home > Home & Garden > Home Renovation: Solar Realization (Video)

Home Renovation: Solar Realization (Video)

David Gottfried’s 28-year- old dream comes true: Solar inverters, modules, and solar electric panels are becoming part of green homes everywhere—including his own.

Thu Nov 20 13:50:00 EST 2008

This is part of a series of video blog posts about green architecture and construction leading up to Greenbuild, the U.S. Green Building Council's annual conference. Planet Green is a Silver sponsor of this year's event, which will be held in Boston November 19-21.

Solar panels make DC power—the kind that comes out of batteries and flows in one direction. That gets fed into a machine called a solar inverter and it flows around a big copper coil and it creates an alternate current—AC current—which is what is used in houses and fed to the grid.

The inverter and our 16 Suntech solar panels represent for me a dream of 28 years. In 1980 I took my first solar class at Stanford with my mentor, Gil Masters, and we designed for our final project our own model solar home. And now, finally here it is.

We'll generate about 2.7 kilowatts of electricity from the sun for our home, and that will make us essentially carbon neutral. At last I'm generating the clean energy I've always dreamed of. In addition, we've installed three solar hot water panels—connected to a Phoenix solar hot water heater, which we'll use for hot water and heating.

Dreams do come true.

David Gottfried started Regenerative Ventures and its consulting arm, WorldBuild in 1995, after founding the U.S. Green Building Council in 1993. He is the author of Greed to Green, and is internationally acknowledged as one of the foremost founders of the global green building movement.

friend's name:
email:
your name:
email:
message:

CLOSE X

Votes

How to Go Green: Electricity COMMENTS	{}
How to Go Green: Weddings COMMENTS	{}
How to Go Green: Rental Properties COMMENTS	{}
How to Go Green: Home Buying COMMENTS	{}
How to Go Green: Home Heating COMMENTS	{}
How to Go Green: Home Electronics COMMENTS	{}

On Now

05:00am Emeril Green
05:30am Emeril Green
06:00am Emeril Green
06:30am Emeril Green

On Tonight

08:00pm Emeril Green
08:30pm Emeril Green
09:00pm Stuff Happens
09:30pm Total Wrecklamation

Votes

Buy Green: Vodka COMMENTS	{}
Buy Green: Pink Champagne COMMENTS	{}
Buy Green: East Coast Beer COMMENTS	{}
Buy Green: Grocery Tote Bags COMMENTS	{}

Votes

recent

popular

discussed

5 Ways to Green Your Video Game System POSTED 6 Jan 2009. COMMENTS	{ }
Copy This Look: Eva Mendes in Brilliant Blue POSTED 6 Jan 2009. COMMENTS	{ }
Looking For Holiday Deals After the Holidays? Choose Companies that Offset Shipping POSTED 6 Jan 2009. COMMENTS	{ }
How to Reclaim a Ceiling Fan POSTED 6 Jan 2009. COMMENTS	{ }
Green Glossary: Seitan Worship POSTED 6 Jan 2009. COMMENTS	{ }

Can't Afford a Hybrid?: Reduce Your Carbon Emissions with these Cheaper, Better Investments POSTED 17 Dec 2008. 4 COMMENTS.	{33}
The Anti-Gift List: 15 Things Everyone Gets and No One Needs POSTED 1 Dec 2008. 22 COMMENTS.	{109}
Emeril's Recipes POSTED 11 Nov 2008. 20 COMMENTS.	{175}
Give Air-Purifying House Plants, a Great Last Minute Gift POSTED 22 Dec 2008. 2 COMMENTS.	{9}
Click These 21 Links to Save The Planet POSTED 23 Dec 2008. 1 COMMENTS.	{6}

Renovation Nation Episode: Chelsea, MA: Wind Powered Condos POSTED 17 Nov 2008. 5 COMMENTS.	{1}
Welcome to the Planet Green Community! POSTED 10 Jul 2008. 19 COMMENTS.	{29}
Stuff Happens Episode: Bathroom POSTED 22 Dec 2008. 7 COMMENTS.	{18}
World's Greenest Homes Episode: Chicago House POSTED 25 Nov 2008. 12 COMMENTS.	{14}
Make Your Own Wind Chimes POSTED 3 Jan 2009. 3 COMMENTS.	{1}

Best Seller

Featured Product

Textured Leather Barrel

- $110.00

Home > Home & Garden > Home Renovation: Solar Realization (Video)

CREDITS	DCL
DISCOVERY SITES	Discovery Channel \| TLC \| Animal Planet \| Discovery Health \| Science Channel \| Planet Green \| Discovery Kids \| Military Channel \| Investigation Discovery \| Discovery Home \| HD Theater \| Turbo \| FitTV \| HowStuffWorks \| TreeHugger \| Petfinder \| PetVideo \| Discovery Education
SHOP	DVDs \| Toys \| Games \| Telescopes \| Gift Ideas
CUSTOMER SERVICE	Contact Us \| Free Newsletters \| RSS \| TV FAQs
CORPORATE	Discovery Communications, Inc. \| Advertising \| Careers @ Discovery \| Privacy Policy \| Visitor Agreement

David Gottfried's Home Renovation: Building a Office Lifepod (Video) 17 Nov 2008 \| COMMENTS Welcome to my new office—the Gottfried Lifepod. This was a joint venture between Envision Solar and my team. We greatly improved the base steel structure with eight solar panels on the roof and figured out how to make it into a super comfortable home office.	{ }
Building an Efficient Bathroom (Video) 19 Nov 2008 \| COMMENTS	{ }
David Gottfried: Green Renovation and Historic Choices (Video) 17 Nov 2008 \| COMMENTS	{ }
How To Reclaim a Light Fixture 30 Dec 2008 \| COMMENTS	{ }
4 Ways To Green Your Roof 8 Dec 2008 \| COMMENTS	{ }

Home Renovation: Solar Realization (Video)

David Gottfried’s 28-year- old dream comes true: Solar inverters, modules, and solar electric panels are becoming part of green homes everywhere—including his own.

David Gottfried's Home Renovation: Building a Office Lifepod (Video)

Building an Efficient Bathroom (Video)

David Gottfried: Green Renovation and Historic Choices (Video)

How To Reclaim a Light Fixture

4 Ways To Green Your Roof

On Now

On Tonight

Best Seller

Featured Product

Ads by Google