PV Gap

April Said:

Can I Build a greenhouse out of commercial refrigeration glass doors? is it sufficient to hold heat in winter?

We Answered:

Since the doors act as insulators from the heat in the freezer case, they will do just fine to hold heat in during winter.
Part of the idea behind a greenhouse is that if properly bult, there is no need to add much extra heat, even in winter.
Without knowing where you live, it is hard to say if supplemental heat will be needed. One way to accomplish this in a more green manner than burning a hydrocarbon fuel, is to use heat storage items in your greenhouse.
Siting the greenhouse so that the maximum sun gain can heat up not just the air inside, but re-cycled old barrels, plastic or metal, filled with water (and a bit of bleach to keep the gunk down) sealed up, and outsides painted black or dark green. If you use these as the "legs" to rest your benches or flats on, you can save more costs there as well.
The concept is for the barrels to absorb the heat as well during the day, and at night, as they cool, the give off the heat back into the green house.
http://www.healthgoods.com/education/hea…
http://www.sherrysgreenhouse.com/pages/s…
might help you oput a bit.
Good luck and well done for wanting to go green!
Kay

Max Said:

Do you think the government should force manufacture of fuel effciant cars?

We Answered:

You can't mandate something like that.

The consumer dictates what will be built. The companies respond to that.

When gas got to $3.00 a gallon, SUV and pickup sales went down to its lowest levels since 1995. People were looking into more efficient cars. Toyota and Honda had already thought ahead and been producting them. The government encourages it by giving tax breaks and allowing them into HOV lanes. The US car makers were still churning out SUV's and fell behind yet again. Now Toyota is poised to become the number one car maker because they're able to think ahead, innovate, and respond quicker to the market.

Now that gas is back to $2.06 a gallon, people are going *whew* and are driving SUV's again. But there is a percentage that are thinking ahead and are selling their SUV's and buying the Toyota's and Honda's.

You can blame the SUV and Minivan market in part on the increased safety levels required by the government. Since they require car seats for each kid, a family with three kids needs a larger vehicle so Minivan's were born. Guys were harassed about driving a "minivan" so the car manufacturers created SUV's to satisfy a guy's ego.

Then you have the Hummer type ads. You've seen them. Where they harass the moms now, calling them wimps and pressuring them to buy Hummers. What a bunch of crap.