Markasaurus

Vinyl Siding

As foreign as vinyl siding seems here in San Francisco (almost everything is wood or stucco), vinyl is the leading exterior finish material for homes in the United States (according to The Vinyl Siding Institute). While I didn’t have a great opinion of vinyl to begin with, watching Daniel Gold and Judith Helfand’s 2002 documentary “Blue Vinyl.”

While the movie dragged at times, its indictment of the vinyl industry is hard to argue with. Creating a product that can’t be safely disposed of is a huge problem. While other siding materials, like fiber cement board, may not be easily recyclable either, vinyl siding is often burned either deliberately or by accident in landfill fires, releasing dioxin into the atmosphere. How bad is dioxin? The Environmental Protection Agency points out that there is “no safe level” for dioxin exposure (read more at http://www.ejnet.org/dioxin/). Well, at least you don’t have to paint vinyl siding…

The Vinyl Siding Institute  has tried to claim that vinyl siding can be a green material, even going as far as instructing people how to get LEED points by using it on new buildings. While the movie portrays it as a difficult choice finding an alternate material to re-clad the filmmaker’s parents’ house, for new construction there are a variety of competitive materials including fiber cement siding and stucco that may cost slightly more up front but don’t carry the tremendous externalities of using a product as toxic as vinyl.

Earth Hour in San Francisco

Before Earth hour: Downtown San Francisco at 8:20pm

I attempted to “celebrate” Earth Hour last weekend by going to Dolores Park (down the street a few blocks from my house) to see if the lights would all shut off at 8:30, as was the idea behind the event. Never mind that I brought my digital camera, never mind that I brought my digital camera. 

At around 8:30 the lights in the park went out and a few notable buildings shut off their lights- City Hall, a few towers downtown, and the Bay Bridge had most of its lights off. Overall, not too shockingly dark though:

During Earth Hour: downtown San Francisco at 8:35pm

I’m not sure how much this token gesture really helps, but maybe it makes people more concious of their electricity usage during the rest of the year. A friend pointed out that lots of extra power was probably used the hour before Earth Hour as people like me charged their digital cameras. Oh well.

One other thing. If you are looking at this in Internet Explorer, all the text is probably pushed against the left side of your browser window. My apologies. I am looking into this and hope to fix it soon.  It’s a great time for you consider switching to Firefox or Google’s Chrome (my new favorite).