Published

11 months ago

March 25, 2025

Alice Rush

Friday, March 14, I had the privilege of speaking at the Sustainability Institute’s (SI) Home Energy Makeover event in Charleston County, SC. Thanks to the homeowner, Ms. Daniels, funding from the Wells Fargo Foundation, the Sustainability Institute, and its contractors, Ms. Daniels’ home received energy efficiency improvements and a solar system with a modeled energy savings of 72%. This will take her bills from about $350 to about $90 per month. This initiative demonstrates what can be accomplished with energy efficiency and renewables.

How did this happen?

A couple of years ago, Ms. Daniels attended a local market and talked to someone from Dominion Energy South Carolina about her high energy bills. They told her about SI. She contacted SI, and they came out and conducted an energy assessment. One year later, SI contacted her and stated that her home was perfect for this Home Energy Makeover opportunity.

Improvements included

Ms. Daniels’ home received top-to-bottom energy efficiency upgrades including:

ENERGY STAR appliances – washer, dryer, stove/oven, refrigerator
Electric heat pump water heater
Heat pump with rigid ductwork and sump pump
Attic insulation and air sealing
5 kW solar system
Basic weatherization – weather stripping, gasketing, door sweeps
Home Energy Monitor to track and manage energy use

Low-income residents are in need

Energy Burden refers to the percentage of income required to pay for electricity in a home. A 6% energy burden is considered high, and according to the National Renewable Energy Lab’s State and Local Planning for Energy Platform, the area where Ms. Daniel’s home is located has an energy burden of 6.74%, and surrounding areas are close to 8-9%.

In Charleston County, just by making energy efficiency upgrades, homeowners have the potential to save almost $600 each year in energy bill reductions. If we look at this statewide, low-income residents throughout South Carolina have the possibility of saving even more. There is so much potential, and we can do more to help our communities. Between low-quality housing stock and low/fixed income, there is a lot of need.

Take this statewide

Wouldn’t having this type of program throughout South Carolina be great? That has been a dream of mine and many in South Carolina, and it’s time for it to become a reality. With proper funding and a trained workforce, we can greatly improve homes in this same fashion. It will take a coordinated effort amongst diverse stakeholders such as non-profits, advocacy organizations, utilities, and others. I hope this model inspires you to invest in South Carolina communities to reduce energy burdens so residents can live in healthy, efficient homes.

For more energy efficiency data, see SACE’s “Energy Efficiency in the Southeast” report.

The post SC Home Energy Makeover – Let’s Take This Statewide!! appeared first on SACE | Southern Alliance for Clean Energy.

SC Home Energy Makeover – Let’s Take This Statewide!!

Renewable Energy

The Positive Effects We’ve Had on Others Are Profound, Whether We Know It or Not

Published

9 hours ago

February 28, 2026

Alice Rush

There’s a theory that most people underestimate the positive effects they’ve had on other people.

Yes, that’s the theme of “It’s a Wonderful Life,” but it’s also the core of the 1995 film “Mr. Holland’s Opus,” in which a music teacher who deemed that his life had been a failure because he never completed writing a great symphony, is gently and beautifully corrected. Please see below.

The Positive Effects We’ve Had on Others Are Profound, Whether We Know It or Not

Renewable Energy

Renewable Energy Concepts Can’t Violate the Laws of Physics

Published

23 hours ago

February 28, 2026

Alice Rush

In the early days of 2GreenEnergy, my people and I were vigorously engaged in finding solid ideas in cleantech that needed funding in order to move forward.

I vividly remember a conversation with a guy in Maryland who was trying to explain the (ostensible) breakthrough that he and his team had made in hydrokinetics. When I was having trouble visualizing what we was talking about, he asked me to “think of it as a river in a box.”

“Oh!” I exclaimed. “You mean you take a box full of standing water, add energy to it get it moving, then extract that energy, leaving you with more energy that you added to it.”

“Exactly.”

I politely explained that the laws of physics, specifically the first and second laws of thermodynamics, make this impossible.

He wasn’t through, however, and insisted that, in his office, his people had constructed a “working model.”

Here’s where my tone descended into something less than 100% polite. I told him that he may think he has a working model, but he’s wrong; if he believes this, he’s ignorant; if he doesn’t, but is conducting this conversation anyway, he’s a fraud.

“But don’t you want to come see it?” he implored.

“No. Not only would not fly across the country to see whatever it is you claim to have built, I wouldn’t walk across the street to a “working model” of something that is theoretically impossible.”

—

I tell this story because the claim made at the upper left is essentially identical. You’re pumping water up out of a stream, and then claiming to extract more energy when the water flows back into the stream.

Of course, social media today is rife with complete crap like this. We’ve devolved to a point where defrauding money out of idiots is rapidly replacing baseball as our national pastime.