The EcoEnergy program of homeowner grants to help retrofit homes has been brought back to life by the federal government in late September of 2011 -- part of the EcoAction initiative. I love this program and the hard workers at NRCan have done a great job of organizing it, explaining it and ma...
Many of you have certainly heard of the beautiful Butchart Gardens in Victoria B.C. As you can imagine, when I visit a place like that I want to see more than just the flowers. So, David Clarke gave me a tour of the hidden side of the gardens: where their water comes from. What may surprise yo...
I remember when low flow shower heads were first introduced they made a lot of noise and gave lousy showers. They certainly have come a long way and have become the standard shower today.One very important step in water conservation is simply to become aware of how much water we use. The first ...
Sometimes water conservation can be helped a bit simply by knowing how much water we use -- awareness. Water Watch is a little water meter, one for the garden hose and another for the shower head, that measures in either litres or gallons. In my household it has already cut down on the water wa...
In this TV segment I talked a lot about the latest research designed to identify which low flow toilets work and which do not. For the details of that story, read through my database entry on the low flush toilet controversy and the update at the bottom of the entry.The very reason for low flow ...
Every major city has some kind of de-construction re-cycling store.Rather than just throwing things away when you renovate, they come in and take it apart for you and take it away for you. That saves you the money of demolition.Then they put it up for sale, providing lots of useful and valuable ...
Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) does not recommend the use of any blown-in insulating material inside "enclosed vertical cavities" (that's a fancy way of saying "walls that are not open"). They feel that techniques of installation and verification during installation are not good ...
How about a house in the middle of Toronto that gets its water from the sky, not from a city water connection, not even a well. Then it gets rid of the waste water into the garden, not a connection to the city, not even a leaching field. Although it may be considered by many to be an experiment...
A dual flush conversion kit for toilets -- saving water.The problem with existing toilets and existing drainage systems is that they were designed and tested using lots of water. When we try to reduce the water in the existing toilet it may not even get the solid waste out of the bowl. Even ...
