hope vs fear

[chelidon]

A friend posted some very eloquent thoughts in her LJ about looking at the world out there, and trying to balance hope and fear. I'm attaching an edited version of my reply. There's a piece in there for me about actively building the world you want to live in, instead of reacting from fear, that preserves hope. I don't replace my oil furnace with a wood burner because I'm afraid oil prices are going to triple, I do it because even if they don't, I don't want to be burning oil -- I want to be part of a sustainable carbon-neutral cycle, where I can grow myself what we need to provide for our heat. I want to put in a microhydro generator not because I'm afraid utility electricity wil be unreliable or prohibitively expensive, I do it because I want to use the resources I have to make clean, sustainable energy, and take that much load off the earth. I don't make an oasis for family, friends and tribe because I want to build a walled compound armed against a hostile world, I want to build a place of beauty so that I and my friends and family can exist in a community of and surrounded by beauty, because that is the way I want to live my life.

For me, it's about hope, and planning for an uncertain future in ways which are based on building places of beauty and life rather than fleeing in fear from shadows and death. I may let fear add some urgency to my work, to kick myself in the butt a bit when I slack off, but I know that if I am controlled by my fears, I will not be building the world in which I want to live, I will be building walls against the world I am afraid of, and that's not sustainable, that doesn't get me where I want to go. I serve the impulse to build and create, not the impulse to hide and retreat. I choose to be for something I passionately believe in, motivated by love, rather than against something I hate, motivated by fear or paranoia.

I want to be as self-sufficient as possible, because I want to live as simply and lightly on the earth as possible, so I work in that direction. I want to know how to take care of myself and my family, and I want to have my family and my tribe around me, to live in a truly sustainable, spiritual community -- so I do what I can to build that. I strengthen my connections with other like-minded people, meet local farmers, artists, vets, doctors, builders, beekeepers, exchange cob recipes and yurt plans with friends, share songs and stories and practical skills. And these are all things I'd want to do anyway, no matter what happens in the world at large. And I hope (though I think I know better) that technology can still somehow save us from what seems to be coming, because I know that in times of economic and social turmoil, it is the poor, the young and old, the weak and the vulnerable who suffer the most. I hope we can avoid any kind of serious calamity, and I'll put my heart into transforming the world in constructive ways, ways which result in the greatest good for the greatest number of people. And I'll keep on building, as best I can, motivated as much as possible by beauty, balance, delight, and love beyond all reason.

And now I'm going to go be totally decadent and for lunch have a couple of the scrumptious cookies my son made me for Father's Day :> Cookies baked by my son give me hope.

Comments

[thefirespiral.livejournal.com]

Exactly, exactly, exactly... that's so much what I was trying to say. Thank you.

[thefirespiral.livejournal.com]

I may let fear add some urgency to my work, to kick myself in the butt a bit when I slack off, but I know that if I am controlled by my fears, I will not be building the world in which I want to live, I will be building walls against the world I am afraid of, and that's not sustainable, that doesn't get me where I want to go.

Actually, I want to mitigate my response a little... because I know what I'm doing is backing away from my "bad" feeling of fear. I still feel it, I still want to shelter my loved ones... but when I let that take over and dictate what I do -- be my primary motivating force, then I am in a bad place. That's when I'm playing the same game but on the other side.

[chelidon.livejournal.com]

I hear ya. Fear can be constructive, fear can be motivating, fear can teach us things -- it's not the fear that's bad, it's being controlled by and serving it. Like you said, playing into that game.

[kiramor.livejournal.com]

On a technical note: HAVE you replaced your oil burning with wood burning? I live in the city and don't have the room that you do, but I live in TX and it doesn't get THAT cold here. I survived this last winter with no heat except a small electric space heater that I used on the coldest nights (mostly I just bundled up). I like having a conventional gas hot water heater and a gas stove, but I wonder about other options for the few weeks a year when I really need reliable heat. . . any thoughts to share? (I'm also yearning to put on some solar panels. Texas. Summer. I bet I could fuel the window units with solar panels.)

[chelidon.livejournal.com]

On a technical note: HAVE you replaced your oil burning with wood

Not yet -- we were waiting until we could do without heat for the week or so it would take to install. Also, part of the reason we need to replace the oil burner is that is has an in-ground tank, and they eventually leak and pollute your soil and groundwater. Ugh. So we were going to excavate the old tank when we built my new office/guest room/wine/root cellar, and do all the digging at once. But...looks like we can't afford to do both the new office and the new furnace at the same time... I swear, planning the logistics for these projects is a job in itself ;>

Anyway, what we want is from these folks: Tarm USA (http://www.tarmusa.com/), a Danish company which makes high-efficiency hydronic (hot water) wood, coal, corn and wood-pellet boilers. Their U.S. facility is about 30 min. from us, so it makes double-sense to go with them. But that makes sense for us because we have hydronic (hot water/radiator) heating, so whatever we replace the oil furnace with (solar, wood, gas, etc) has to make hot water. if you don't have radiators, you'd be looking at a different kind of heater, perhaps a small wood or wood pellet stove.

any thoughts to share?

mmm. Big topic, lots we could talk about for sure. It's possible you could do a wood stove, but wood stoves do require a chimney pipe (can be metal, doesn't have to be a full masonry chimney), so you'd need to see about putting one in according to local code if you don't have it already. Wood stoves also of course require building a fire when you want to keep warm -- kinda fun, and romantic, but is that something you want to do on a regular basis?

One of the reasons the Tarm heater will work so well for us as a whole-house solution in a cold climate is that we'll be pairing it with a really big (600-800 gallon) insulated hot water storage tank. The way it works is that you only have to fill the wood boiler once a day in the winter, and maybe once every week or two in the summer. The fire burns clean and hot for a couple of hours, heats the big tank of water, and you get your heat and hot water from that tank until the next time you want to fire up the boiler. It keeps you from having to feed the boiler all the time, and it burns a lot cleaner than without a storage tank. We're going to get a small high-efficiency gas furnace as well, as backup in case we all want to go away for a while. If we ever do put in solar hot water, we can pipe that into the same hot water storage tank -- the tank acts as a kind of general-purpose heat battery.

Solar PV (photovoltaic) is cool, but still pretty expensive -- it can help if you get a tax break, which some states and cities will give you. Besides the panels, you have to buy a good quality inverter to convert the panel D/C into A/C, and batteries for storage unless you use a grid-tie system (using the electric grid as a big battery, good and cheap as long as the grid is up). Solar hot water can be cheaper, and can give you hot water and you can also use it to heat your place if you put in a small radiator (or put in radiant flor heating, yum, but can be a pain to retrofit into an existing house), and of course with solar, if there's no sun...

Since you have gas already, your cheapest and simplest bet might be a small high-efficiency on-demand gas space heater, or a gas fireplace (very popular lately, self-contained, push a button and it lights up and looks like a little fireplace, very minimal exhaust requirement -- some apparently don't even need a chimney pipe). That's not a renewable solution, but it is a *lot* more efficient than an electric heater, so you're gaining there. You could also go for a small wood stove, if you have access to a reasonably cheap supply of wood and you want to build fires. There's also corn or pellet stoves -- easy to use, high efficiency, renewable source, but you still have to buy your fuel (bags of wood or corn pellets), and it does require electricity to operate, unlike most traditional wood stoves.

I've started looking at masonry stoves (http://chimneykeepers.com/masonheater.html), but that's probably a lot more elaborate solution than you need...

[kiramor.livejournal.com]

Thanks -- that was very helpful. I forget that you're in a much colder climate than I -- you would be unhappy with only a teeny space heater all winter, I suspect. :) Considering where I live, probably the thing I most need to consider is summer cooling solutions as that's what compromises the majority of my energy usage. The City of Austin does give kickbacks for setting up solar, though I would need to do some research before I felt ready to approach the project properly.

[chelidon.livejournal.com]

No problem, this is something I've been spending a good amout of time looking into. Yeah, rather different regional requirements and priorities, for sure. If you can do wood heat, it turns out it's a lot easier to live with a minimal energy footprint in a cold climate over a hot one, unless you're willing to get by in the hot climate without the air conditioning. We don't have air conditioning, don't really need it (high today is low 80s, high tomorrow is 72 degrees, and mid-80s is about as hot as it ever typically gets), but we couldn't do without heat in the winter. You're pretty much on the opposite end of the spectrum. Even the most efficient air conditioners use a lot of electricity, so you pretty much need a source of plenty of electricity (which in a pinch we can do without, as long as we have a source of heat). You could do solar PV, and that can get expensive, but you could always do a few panels at a time, as you can afford it. Fans are no problem, though you can definitely power them from a couple of small panels.

Your simplest and cheapest way to conserve, though, is to systematically go through and replace all of your incandescent bulbs with compact fluorescents. Our local electric co-op sells cheap (subsidized) CF bulbs, about 1/2 retail price, maybe yours does as well. They tend to last a lot longer than incandescents, too. Next check your major appliances. The 'fridge is one of the worst, and if you are willing to pay a significant premium (about $1000), you can get a ConServ (http://store.yahoo.com/affordablesolar/1165.html) or a Sun Frost (http://www.sunfrost.com/). They'll pay for themselves over time in reduced electricity costs, but that's still a lot to pay for a fridge. We're still using the ones that came when we bought the house, but when they give out, we'll get high-efficiency models. A fridge energy use increases a lot with outside temp, too -- if I remember right, they use more than twice as much electricity at 90 degrees than at 75. Out here, we could build an outside ice box which would work for free a good part of the year, and in in-ground root cellar which would do for refrigeration most of the rest of the year, and I'm looking into that option.