10 thoughts on “Your Green House”

  1. I’ve been planning on creating a stash of hundreds of conventional/cheap light bulbs that I’ll store in my attic — enough to last two to four decades. I can’t stand CFLs and 2/3s of the fixtures in my house have conventional dimmers which helps with the lifetime of a standard bulb. I figure the stash will also help the resale value of my house when I leave them for the new owner in a decade or two. By then they should be a rare commodity. When the ‘big brother’ inspectors come by, out go the bulbs, and in go the CFLs until the inspection is over.

    Of course with things going in this country I envision a “Fahrenheit 451” scenario where jack booted government agents acting on a tip one day storm my house to relieve me of may light bulb stash. Do you think prison time will be associated with being caught with such contraband, or will it just be a short stint at a re-education camp?

  2. This is yet another reason to go off the grid, even if you live in suburbia.

    Solar panels and windmills.

  4. Mike, I was thinking something similar. How about a business that’ll strip out your appliances for a day or two every time the Feds inspect the place? A home that consumes zero energy (because there’s nothing in it) should be able to pass most of these federal guidelines.

    Also, I imagine utility companies will get creative in billing so as to avoid triggering federal inspections. Still this seems to be an incredibly stupid overreach of government power.

  5. Karl, I presume that should such energy plans be put in place that it will take a form similar to base-line water consumption here in California. Such a scheme basically encourages consumers to over-water their yards during wet years so that when a dry year comes along their base-line water consumption is much higher than their neighbors who didn’t over-water. During dry years they can then “save” water by reverting to the normal water usage they should have been using all along and keep their lawn green while all their neighbors go brown.

    By regulating consumer energy usage the government will produce a perverse incentives that encourage consumers to waist energy so that they can then “save” energy without inconveniencing their lives.

    If the politicians want to reduce energy usage then they should just have the courage to simply and straightforwardly raise taxes on energy use. If the citizens don’t like the taxes they can vote them out of office. By coming up with elaborate “cap and trade” schemes and regulations such as those discussed in Rand’s link just grows bureaucracy and in the end accomplishes nothing. Then fixes are put in place to fix the unintended consequences and the end result is such a complicated cancerous mess it can never be excised.

  6. Well that should open up new home sales, as people will be unable to sell their old home, when it doesn’t meet government standards. Freeze the population in place! It makes it easier to predict tax rolls.

  7. More unionized government workers to keep these people in power and lord it over those of us not on the dole government payroll.

  8. A policeman once tried to give me a speeding ticket. He asked me if my out of state license had the correct address. I told him no, I’d become homeless since getting the license and didn’t have an address. He didn’t know what to do and I didn’t get the ticket.

    I suggest when they come to inspect the home, you are unable to find the owner.

  9. Hello folks,

    Stumbled onto the site and like what I’ve found.

    “By coming up with elaborate “cap and trade” schemes and regulations such as those discussed in Rand’s link just grows bureaucracy and in the end accomplishes nothing.”

    Other than fattening climate-saver Gore and friends wallets by creating a new derivatives market?

    Hope someone has some thoughts on these questions:
    1) As a third wave of foreclosures hits due to ‘skyrocketing’ utility bills, who do they think will pay for their new Ponzi scheme?
    2) Is the plan to destroy the economy so promptly legislative content is moot, as new and improved legislation will be proposed to handle upcoming crises?

    A final query:
    Have any of you good folks thought about the new and improved food/crop, water rights, and NAIS livestock chipping legislation pending? Control the food and the most staunch defenders of the Constitution may need to reconsider faced with famine. [Unless a gifted hunter or sitting on a stockpile of food reserves.] I worry that the beast won’t be starved before we are?

    PS- I thought about stocking up on incandescent bulbs, too. Could be a black market commodity. ‘I’ll trade a pound of parsnips for a 3-way 250 watt bulb!”

  10. A final query:
    Have any of you good folks thought about the new and improved food/crop, water rights, and NAIS livestock chipping legislation pending? Control the food and the most staunch defenders of the Constitution may need to reconsider faced with famine.

    There’s a maxim (sometimes attributed to Lenin) that “no government is more than 3 missed meals away from a revolution.”

    They can keep pushing but there can come the time when the people decide to push back. The image of politicians (and perhaps bureaucrats) swinging from lampposts is horrid but not completely out of the question.

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