Fox Valley homeowners learn how to build green

From an article by Marueen Wallenfang in the Green Bay Press Gazette:

Imagine you have a palatial home with more than 5,500 square feet of living space with four bedrooms, five bathrooms, theater, pub room and heated garage.

And your monthly gas and electric bills average $98.30 a month.

Here's another shocker: One utility bill in this particular home last summer was $13.

While a large home is a fantasy for most people, smaller utility bills may not be if homeowners are willing to invest in energy efficiencies.

Harmony House in the Town of Clayton is the large home with the enviable utility bills.

While it was a case-study home built under the Department of Energy's Building America Program, using design features that will be considered benchmarks for 2020 building codes, it can be an object lesson for those who want to follow in its rather small carbon footprint.

An energy efficiency seminar takes place Wednesday at Harmony House, and the general public is invited to come and listen to expert Kevin Hogan of the Wisconsin Energy Conversation Corp., a nonprofit that administers programs for Focus on Energy.

"Cheap energy is a thing of the past," he told a group of about a dozen people gathered in a similar seminar earlier this month. "Oil and natural gas are finite resources. It's going to cost us more and more. Whatever you can reduce is going to put money in your pocket."

In the upcoming Wednesday seminar, he will again highlight energy-saving changes any homeowner can make, from buying Energy Star appliance to upgrading windows, insulation and ventilation. He covers issues for new and existing homes.

No one assumes homebuyers will go to the extent that BerHoff Homes went in Harmony House, which it built for a little more than $900,000 and is for sale at $998,900. It was part of a home tour in February 2008.

Hogan said if the home had been built with more standard systems, energy costs would average $650 a month.

Besides being a tightly built home with generous insulation, perfect ventilation and lavish use of renewable energy sources like ground heat and the sun, it far exceeds Energy Star standards in big and small ways.

If you go
What: "Learn to Build Green and Energy Efficient" seminar
Where: At a private home called Harmony House, 3077 Saffron Lane, Town of Clayton, west of Neenah.
When: Wednesday. The 5:30 p.m. presentation is about one hour, followed by audience questions
Cost: Free
Presenter: Kevin Hogan, program coordinator for Wisconsin Energy Conversation Corp.
Host: BerHoff Homes
Information and directions: www.berhoffhomes.com