Over the last 30 years, I've been engaged in trying to raise awareness on the issue of climate change. I never imagined decades later, I would be fighting the same battle.
After years of talk and political paralysis, we have reached a tipping point, climate change is no longer a problem of the future, we are experiencing the results of a warming planet all around us, rising seas, widening deserts and deadly wildfires. We are losing control of our future. Our civilization is threatened today by changes that have been taking place over decades.
Climate change affects everyone, in every country. Climate change is in everybody's backyard. Only by acting now and standing together can we tip the scales and achieve the results necessary to make the planet a healthy and safe place to live—for now and for the future. At one time energy conversation was only about oil, coal and gas. Now people are talking about renewable energy—how it can result in cheaper and plentiful energy, and the positive role this can play on the environment.
Climate change presents us with a huge challenge, how to move a society that has been dependent on fossil fuels to a future that is cleaner and more sustainable.
While it is easy to become discouraged there is reason for optimism. There is a groundswell occurring and it's rising from the ground up. Leadership is coming from people themselves. We have the opportunity to re-think how we live in this world now and for future generations.
I have great faith in the power of innovation and the ingenuity of people from all walks of life to solve this problem. Technological advances are well under way—renewable energy, increased efficiency and innovation in building practices are gaining momentum.
One way to reduce the need and desire for fossil fuel is to design houses that require less fuel to build, operate, and to heat and cool. When houses are thoughtfully built this way, the energy requirement is vastly reduced. Renewable energy that uses solar thermal panels, photovoltaic panels, wind turbines, and geothermal systems—combined with good design—creates houses that require no fossil fuel.
We know that 38 to 40 percent of the energy in this country is used to heat and cool our buildings-residential and commercial. This old way is expensive, dirty, and a proven danger to life. Yet it's a problem with a solution. But we must decide to apply that solution now.
This book advocates for smaller houses, which is a strong trend in this country. Smaller houses reduce wasted space that most people don't need or use. Smaller, better-built houses teach us to curb our appetite for energy, and lessen our need to build, heat, cool, and maintain that extra space we don't need or even want. Building smaller, along with building houses prefabricated—in the process using less time, fewer materials, and using both more efficiently—is the sanest and wisest recipe for home construction, for now and for the future.
