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Passive House Design In order to utilize ambient heat from appliances, the house needs to be incredibly well insulated. It’s essentially air tight, allowing the ventilation system to trap the heat and distribute it throughout the home. Passive homes have specific design requirements, such as “superinsulation” and superwindows.

It would be extremely expensive to retrofit a house as a passive house, making it more suited to new construction or a home that is undergoing a massive renovation. Even with the energy savings, it would take a long time to break even on the investment with a retrofit. The architect behind the passive house in Berkeley said:

By doing smaller insulating renovations, you can improve energy consumption and you’ll definitely make a difference. But to get to Passive House standards, you really have to either rip out the outside or the inside of the house.

Improving Your Own Home’s Energy Usage Homeowners can still take some lessons from passive house construction, even if they can’t afford a huge renovation. According to the US Department of Energy, over 1/3 of Americans’ energy bills goes towards heating their homes. Something as simple as sealing cracks around doors and windows can make a big difference in the amount of electricity or gas you’re using to keep your home warm. Many power companies provide cheap or even free home energy audits to help determine where you need additional sealing and insulation. There are a number of inexpensive things you can do to improve your home’s efficiency.

Comments from around the web:

• There are several dozen of these near me, but I live in Germany in a new development. All houses are well insulated here by US standards but the Passivhaus specialises in central-air flow management and the use of a heat exchanger between the incoming and outgoing air.
• Since the passive house standard is essential an energy consumption limit, a warmer climate requires less stringent measures than a colder one. Here (as evidenced by Nabih’s house) what is required is reasonably airtight double pane windows, 2×6 OVE framing and good design - this is pretty much the de-rigueur “green building” standard here anyway. In addition to radically lowered energy costs and increased indoor air quality and comfort, you eliminate the necessity for a conventional HVAC system. This is the key to LOWER construction costs for a Passive House than a building which is “designed” to save energy without a clear goal, target or reward in mind. People who profess expertise in the subject should speak from an informed point of view. Regardless, the climate crisis requires that we think beyond the conventional “payback” thinking which has gotten us into this mess in the first place. The State of California has mandated all new homes be zero energy by 2020 - I am aware of no other currently feasible path to this than the Passive House approach…

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Kirkwood’s tombstone (on the left) includes a long list of awards and positions, including the American Chemical Society Award in Pure Chemistry, the Richards Medal, and the Lewis Award.

Onsager’s tombstone, in its original form, simply said “Nobel Laureate.” When Onsager’s wife Gretel died in 1991 and was buried there, his children added an asterisk after “Nobel Laureate,” and “*etc.” in the lower right corner of the stone.

It seems Onsager didn’t want to let Kirkwood’s accomplishments go to his head(stone). That and Onsager’s Nobel Prize trumps Kirkwood’s straight.

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This observation led me to wonder whether okcupid is engaging in tactics that are exploiting unwary members to increase the value of their ads? Is it possible that they are now determining ad placement based upon the content of images? Are they placing ads for weight-loss services or products next to images of overweight people??

An overweight woman seeing the ad may feel moved to click it not only because she might want to lost 80 pounds like the woman in the ad, she’ll also be moved to do so because she doesn’t want to have such an ad placed near her picture, especially on a DATING SITE! A dating site member will be more inclined to click such an ad if she believes that possible matches are also seeing the weight-loss ad next to her picture.

The power of such a strategy is undeniable. If you have images of yourself posted on sites that include ads, your image may be used to promote products or services relating to your imperfections. If you have acne, or yellow teeth, or you’re overweight, or balding, or poorly dressed, your image may be leveraged to promote the products or services presented in a nearby ad.

If this strategy is being employed, it’d be good to know of more examples. If you have found any please let me know and I’ll put them up. And voice your opinion on the matter by leaving a comment!

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