Green Building in the Arava--Part I

I recently traveled to the hottest part of the desert (unless you count the Dead Sea)--the Arava. This was a field trip with my department to see some of the principles of desert architecture in practice. Our first stop was Neot Smadar, a kibbutz. The first picture is a view of the kibbutz from the top of their orchard. You can see the hyper arid desert that surrounds the kibbutz, and the trees and pond that they have created.

The kibbutz was founded in 1989, by a group of friends living in Jerusalem who decided they wanted to form a community together. Another kibbutz called Shizafon that had been formed here did not work out, and was abandoned. The group of friends moved in and began planting trees with water pumped in. The purpose of our trip was not to evaluate the sustainability of their farming, although it was clear that they do what they can to reuse water, and to find uses for saline water. Also their agriculture is organic.

The reason we went to Neot Smadar was that they construct their own buildings, and try to incorporate passive cooling techniques. The most remarkable example of this is their arts center. They built a blue and pink building that looks bizarre from far away, to house their resident artists and eventually to contain a cafe and serve as a spot to sell their artwork. Unfortunately, my picture from far away did not come out well, but I was able to take pictures of many details. And what details. From afar it looks strange, so it is missing something of Gaudi's harmony, but from up close the details are breathtaking. It is cooled by a high cooling tower in the center, so that air conditioning is not needed. The members themselves planned and constructed the building, with some help from an outside engineer. a couple of the details (like for the cast iron railings) were executed outside the kibbutz.







I always love artwork that incorporates natural themes, especially animals, so as you can see this was right up my alley. I just loved their bull designs. It is incredible to me that a community of non-specialists could create such beautiful things. They also have delicious ice cream (possibly from their goat milk?). Join me for Part II, where I will show some pictures of the grassroots green architecture from kibbutz Lotan.

Cleaning

I have to admit from the beginning that I am not a great cleaner. I don't really notice a dirty floor or layer of dust. This is probably good for my quality of life, because I don't have to spend very much time cleaning. I do dishes and clean food messes immediately, but sweeping, dusting and mopping are low on my list. My dear husband feels differently. He doesn't like cleaning either, but his preference for clean is stronger than mine. Which means that he acts as our cleaning conscience every few weeks and we have to buckle down and sweep and mop the house.

Because I think so little about cleaning, I never have given much thought to environmentally friendly cleaning products, and when we moved in here, we bought the old standards. Recently, due to renewed consciousness about living simply, I have discovered that water works only slightly less well than the toxic stuff. I have been adding a little bit of soap if it just doesn't come off. But I don't find an alternative to paper towels. Here in Israel most people use a kind of cleaning cloth that is reusable but I always end up with piles of grime when I use it. I guess when we move we will try to make a more complete turnaround. I hear vinegar, baking soda and lemon can work wonders. The truth is that when we clean, and also when the cleaning lady cleans the floors in my lab, I get a headache, so regardless of long term effects and even environmental effects, I am not fond of the toxic cleaners. If only I can find a way around paper towels.

Reduce--personal energy usage

The student housing that I have been issued as a master's student at the Blaustein Institute for Desert Research is environmentally friendly. It is lit during the day by daylight. It is heated in the winter by passive solar heating and during the summer we keep it cool by keeping everything closed. We have a solar hot water heater. I believe that the materials they used weren't the most sustainable, although I would have to check. This is a shame because according to the New York Times, the most important energy usage in buildings comes from the construction phase, so the building of the materials and then the durability of the house (if it isn't durable, you have to construct it again quickly).

However, living in a house that is designed to reduce my energy consumption has been interesting. I never gave a lot of thought to these issues, or the thought I gave was based on how much I was paying, before.

Nevertheless, my husband and I found that even here, we are among the highest electricity users. How could this be? I care about conservation. But it appears that like many conservationists, I care, but don't let that translate into action. I think it probably boils down to the big conservation indicator--wealth. My husband is older than I, saved money before returning for his Ph.D., and earns a higher scholarship than I. And we pool our resources and don't have children. So we don't have the same economic incentive to conserve electricity and have more devices that use electricity.

Even so, our electricity consumption is made up of the following:
12 lights (one of which I now replaced with a fluorescent)
1 ceiling fan
1 electronic fan
electronic component of our hot water heater
stereo
computer
hair dryer (SELDOM used)
oven
refrigerator
microwave
hot plate
electric teakettle
tv
cable box
phone
sony playstation
chargers for camera, cell phones, toothbrushes
electronic fan in the bathroom
2 space heaters
alarm clock
That is 32 items. Since hearing that we are high electricity consumers, I have tried to make some changes.

1. when a light went out, I replaced it with fluorescent lightbulb. DH hated the light, and it was in the area he uses as a workspace when he works from home. Instead, I put the fluorescent in the outside light, which we seldom use, but which it is possible to accidentally turn on and leave on, causing a big electricity drain.

2. I learned that vampires, things that suck energy when they are plugged in, even if not on, can use 10% of your electricity. For example a tv or cable box. So I try diligently to unplug them when not on, and educated DH about that. Also chargers stay unplugged now when not in use.

3. I learned that despite my previous hazy notion, items like computers do use more energy when left on. So now I try to always turn off the computer when not in use, and also pay attention to other things like the ceiling fan or radio, and turn them off.

Even with these changes, we have not done anything drastic. Our biggest usage is probably due to the fact that I am one of those people who is always cold, so we were leaving a space heater on overnight in the winter. What we should have done, is bought an extra blanket. Surely we could have even bought a used one, or borrowed one from DH's family. It is embarrassing to write that we didn't do that, but one must be honest.

Treehuggers

Apparently in the past month, several trees have been chopped down on our Sede Boqer campus. A neighbor of mine organized a meeting to discuss this. I was unsure about going. While I do not want trees cut down, I was not sure that it was an issue that merited mass efforts in contra. Nevertheless, I attended the meeting to understand why my neighbor found it important.

It seems that while it may not be strictly necessary to cut down the trees, if they are in the path of a truck, it may just be easier for the construction workers to cut down the tree. With no public outcry, no one was forced to consider this. While the administration representative told us that trees are important to him, he is very busy and surely has no wish to micromanage the grounds crew.

Our first action was to write names for each tree in an area where we believe construction is imminent, in English, Hebrew and Arabic, with a notice asking not to cut down the tree. The names were removed the following day.

I believe that no trees have been cut down since the first meeting, but another meeting was held last night. There was a discussion about solutions, and the organizers said that their ideal is that a committee would be formed, consisting of members from various disciplines, to decide the fate of each tree whose demise might be suggested. Today some participants met with the administration, and will be allowed to see plans. And the administration today had a value of each tree written in at approximately $2000 on their contracts.

This struggle is beginning only now. And someone came up with an interesting idea--that of transforming the gardens on our campus into a botanical garden representing native plants. I love that idea.

While this may not be a standout issue, it is important in our community. It has been interesting to see the way that two meetings have energized a small group of people, and caused innovative solutions to be thought up. We are lucky in that we live and study in a very ecologically aware campus, so the administration ultimately does support these issues, as does the local community.

Ramat Hovav Explosion

There was an explosion today at Ramat Hovav. Three workers were injured, highway 40 was shut down (I hope we'll be able to get home) and it seems that they evacuated the Bedouins who live in an unrecognized settlement across the street.

Frugality

In the past couple of years, I have become more frugal. I have the feeling that may end in a few months, when we move back to the US. Now we live in a small desert town. There is a supermarket here, sufficient for buying needs (not wants). There is also a cafeteria that serves the same hot food until 7 p.m. and stays open for simple pastries and ice cream until 11? The truth is that the food there is extremely unappetizing so is no kind of temptation. I would much rather cook, or just make a sandwich, than eat there. Our supermarket closes at 7, so there is no last minute running out for the ingredient you forgot, or midnight ice cream runs. In fact, the supermarket closes early on Fridays (2) and is not open on Saturdays.

So basically there is no way to spend your money unless you travel. Since it is a small community, and we are all students, and things in Israel tend to be casual (except in Tel Aviv), there is no need for designer clothes. In fact, it isn't even a temptation to be at the mall and see fancy outfits because you just can't conceive of wearing them here.

There are no billboards here. The university gives us free satellite tv and internet connection. On satellite tv, most of the stations don't have any commercials. If you want to know about the newest product, you have to do some research.

We do go to the nearby city of Beer Sheva on a regular basis, and our biggest temptation is to go out for a reasonable dinner. Spending more on dinner seldom gets you better food in Beer Sheva. Since we live 45 minutes away, the temptation to drink is minimal.

There is a student pub here, but the prices are very low, so to get very drunk maybe you pay $10. The pub is open twice a week. I can't get very drunk very often (okay once in the close to two years that we have been here), so a further lack of temptation.

Since our housing is environmentally friendly, our electricity bill is low. We pay about $30 a month for my husband's portion of our housing--my portion is covered by my scholarship. Our biggest expenses are car related. We do have a used car, and we drive it to visit my husband's family 2.5 hours away from here every two weeks. We also frequently drive to Beer Sheva if both of us want to go there.

I don't feel deprived. Actually, being a newlywed, most of the time I am very happy. I hope I will take a lesson back to the US, that stuff is not important to happiness. It is harder there, when you are surrounded by advertising and opportunities to buy. I can't say that I am by nature a frugal person. I always try to sock away money, contribute to retirement accounts and find a way to be self sufficient. But I usually exceed my budget for things like eating out. While my dream expenditures are travel and classes, I secretly love clothing and pampering. If I were rich I could probably adjust to designer labels and day spas.

I think most people have some kind of stuff that really appeals to them. A lot of people like cars, or gadgets. To tell you the truth, it takes no kind of discipline for me to say no to an expensive new car or the latest gadget. With cars I just want something reliable and fuel efficient, and prefer public transportation or walking anyway. By far. I don't even want to learn how to use the latest gadget. I like internet radio, I feel like it has eliminated my need ever to buy cds (which I hate anyway--I am waiting for a new medium that doesn't get scratched so easily like almost all of my cd's did when I transferred them to a travel case). Books are a halfway temptation for me--I love to read, but I hate moving books around. I prefer to use the library or buy used and then donate.

Muesli

Well I started on the muesli today. It is very hard to eat! I think my jaw muscles will get toned. But I feel great... Maybe the next step will be making my own but it seems complicated.