designgrizzly’s Recent Comments

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  And the award goes to...

  I'm afraid this will be just like the "America's Fattest Cities" ranking.  There will be a limited amount of discussion around the watercooler, and then citizens will continue to expend great amounts of energy, even as their local governments protest and struggle with solutions to the problem.

  Hopefully, in this case, local governments can leverage real financial incentives for decreased energy use, rather than implement cheap public awareness campaigns simply asking people to eat less fried chicken and gravy.
  On U.S. cities will report greenhouse-gas emissions posted 1 year, 3 months ago 1 Response

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  Why so big?!?

  Our desire for huge personal living spaces is part of our environmental problem surrounding shelter.  It would be great if these guys would also address that in their design.

  Can I get something in a 1200 sqft, maybe with some vertical storage options?On Pretty houses posted 2 years, 10 months ago 19 Responses

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  long-term opportunities

  For all the reasons already posted and outlined, this is a great thing.  However, I have yet to see anything about the long-term effects of this initiative.  Wal-Mart and GE are taking a bold step here, but I would challenge them (as if they'd really listen..) to take it a step further.

  All 1.5 billion or however many of these bulbs will end up in landfills.  I would like to see a product takeback initiative organized by Wal-Mart and GE, so that in 8 years, when my bulbs burn out, I can take them back to Wal-Mart, and they will be appropriately processed.

  This will be a design challenge for GE, but most likely worth it in the long run.  Can they reuse the tiny dots of mercury?  Probably.  What about the phosphor?  Maybe not, but they can probably remove it from the glass and recycle that for new bulbs.  Ballast components?  Some of those can probably be re-used, including the plastic housings.  The possibilities are there, and ripe for exploitation - and would probably pay for themselves in materials and manufacturing savings.

  This type of product stewardship initiative would make me really excited about this news.On Are there downsides to the retail giant's efforts to up sales of CFLs? posted 3 years, 2 months ago 17 Responses