Green Chicago Renovation Has it All
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto 
on 03.13.08
Michelle Litvin for The New York Times
There are always treats in the New York Times Thursday House & Home section; the latest offering is a new green renovation in Chicago for artists Frances Whitehead and James Elniski, designed by William James. It mixes clean modern architecture with all the green bells and whistles, including ground source heat pumps, wind turbines, solar hot water heating and photovoltaics. The architect says “Coordinating all the systems was tremendously complex, partly because of the nature of the systems and partly because of the interfaces. “We were also working with a long, narrow existing building and retrofitting it. The clearances that we had to work with were minimal in some cases.”
The article is a bit heavy on the payback period, questioning the investment in so much green hardware. Discussing $40,000 wind turbines, Ms. Whitehead says “We could have bought two new cars for the same money, but we’d rather have these.” more in ::New York Times complete with good ::Slide show
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This is a great model for everyone we need to de-centralize energy, resources and food and produce it on site.