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Planning Tour Highlights “Green” Examples

By The Independent ⋅ December 4, 2008 ⋅ Email This Post Email This Post ⋅ Print This Post Print This Post ⋅ Post a comment

Local efforts to employ sustainable materials, harness natural energy and develop proactive measures for preserving the natural environment were featured during a “Green Building Walk & Talk”, hosted by the Currituck County Planning Department on November 20, 2008.

Currituck Senior Planner Holly White led the outing, which began at the Historic Courthouse and included stops in Lower Currituck and Kitty Hawk. Each location focused on a certain type of “green” project and included discussion on how the various initiatives not only provide beneifts to the environment, but to local citizens and businesses as well.

To start the tour, a project to develop a rain garden at the Historic Courthouse was introduced by Jan Perry-Weber, an Agriculture Technician with the Cooperative Extension Center in Currituck. Once complete, this rain garden will be the first of its kind on the Currituck mainland.

Situated behind the courthouse parking lot, the rain garden will eventually include a small rainwater retention pond, several attractive plantings of native species and hedges. It will incorporate design techniques such as berms and sand chimneys to promote proper retention and filtration of rainwater. Perry-Weber explained that the idea behind the rain garden is to significantly diminish the amount of impure runoff that flows into the Currituck Sound and surrounding properties.

“The plants act as a filtration system. They will cut down impurities by 30%,” she said.

The rain garden’s development has just recently begun, but Perry-Weber said she hopes the first round of planting and site work is completed by the end of the year.

After seeing how planned vegetation can help protect the natural environment, participants learned how builders and property owners can implement environmentally friendly techniques in development. Meredith Robbins, a Planning Department intern who attends the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, explained the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) rating system.

LEED concepts include sustainable site planning, water efficiency, renewable energy, conservation of materials and indoor environmental quality. LEED projects are largely voluntary, but Robbins noted that some localities, such as Durham County, have begun requiring LEED certification for new public buildings. Some areas offer developers green building incentives, such as tax credits and exemptions, to promote these initiatives in private construction, Robbins said.

To view a renewable energy source, the tour visited the home of Dean Carrico to view his application of a residential wind turbine. Earlier this year, Carrico had a 35-foot turbine installed on his property. This is the first residential turbine of its type on the mainland.

Carrico estimates that his turbine generates from 600 to 1,000 kilowatts of energy each month, depending on the wind. He is currently not using this production for power in his home, but sells the energy created by the turbine to Dominion Power and N.C. Green Power.

The turbine can spin up to 300 revolutions-per-minute, Carrico said. It will shut off automatically when wind speed reaches 65 mph, and can be lowered in the event of a strong storm. Perched atop a sturdy tower, the turbine rotates with the wind to maximize energy production.

Carrico noted that noise generated from the turbine is minimal. He promotes the use of natural energy sources for residential, business and public properties as a way to preserve energy and increase financial savings.

“With this and solar, you may not have a power bill,” Carrico said.

Following the wind turbine presentation, the group toured the Kitty Hawk home of Dennis Saver and Nancy White. This couple truly has an impressive green home. It was built with sustainable materials, furnished with recycled products and contains a system designed by Saver to collect, filter and reuse rainwater in the house.

In the four years since the couple built and installed the system, they have only had to purchase water from the town of Kitty Hawk once, Saver said. Three 2,100 gallon tanks hold the water, which is collected by gutters from the roof. Slick roofing tiles made of rubber facilitate the runoff of rainwater to the gutters.

The water travels through a series of filters before it is used within the house. This provides Saver and White a fresh and clean water supply for all uses, including drinking, washing and flushing toilets. Two of the storage tanks are in the garage, while a third sits behind the house.

A solar hot water heater provides hot water and the couple has a propane gas backup system if needed. One unique feature of the home is that hot water travels through tubes under the floor - which is made of sustainable tile - to warm the floor and home. The solar energy needed to power the water heater is captured by four solar panels atop the roof, each of which measures 4-feet by 8-feet in size.

The Saver and White home features many additional aspects in their effort to be environmentally conscientious. These include using insulation made from recycled material, a wood heater with ducts transporting heat throughout the home, whole-house fans to distribute air, insulated low-E glass windows and fluorescent lighting.

The location of the home itself was also planned with energy in mind. It faces south to take full advantage of sunlight and was built into a small hill with several trees close to the home. This helps to use the earth’s temperature in heating and cooling the house, while also protecting the solar panels from strong winds.

White, who works with the Coastal Studies Institute, estimates the house was built for $100 per square foot. The couple saved money, however, because the water system was designed, built and is maintained by Saver, a builder with Earthsaver, LLC.

Links of Interest:

  • Currituck County Planning Department
  • East Coast Wind Turbines
  • Dominion Power
  • NC Green Power
  • NC Cooperative Extension Center - Currituck
  • Earthsaver, LLC

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