kiva, green housing
I finally got myself an account at www.kiva.org - I kept wanting to get one but I was like "I am so poor" but I finally decided I'm not THAT poor and did it. I have been fascinated by microlending ever since going to the SAID development conference my freshman year and learning about it. I really want to know the effect of organizational structure on... well EVERYTHING. Because the same difference of impact between standard bank practices and microlending can be applied to more than just money, and applied on more than one scale/size.
Now to another interesting thought: when i went to www.globalgreen.org and clicked on Rebuild New Orleans I saw this quote: Did you know? If 50,000 of the homes destroyed by Hurricane Katrina were rebuilt according to the green standards applied to Global Green USA's Holy Cross Project, residents of New Orleans would save $38 million to $56 million EVERY year, eliminating 1/2 a million total tons of CO2 - the equivalent of taking 100,000 cars off the road.
I knew that sustainable housing helped reduce energy consumption for heating/cooling but to look at it that way, what a crazy amount. And in my mind, isn't this something George Bush could get behind? Maybe I am too optimistic but wasn't his whole problem with the Kyoto Protocol that limits on emissions would hurt the economy? I don't think that building according to "greener" codes would hurt the economy because we're still building but now people can afford their utility bills and we cut emissions!! What do you think? Do you think people would be more willing to buy a more expensive house with less expensive utility bills, rather than give up their car?
Now to another interesting thought: when i went to www.globalgreen.org and clicked on Rebuild New Orleans I saw this quote: Did you know? If 50,000 of the homes destroyed by Hurricane Katrina were rebuilt according to the green standards applied to Global Green USA's Holy Cross Project, residents of New Orleans would save $38 million to $56 million EVERY year, eliminating 1/2 a million total tons of CO2 - the equivalent of taking 100,000 cars off the road.
I knew that sustainable housing helped reduce energy consumption for heating/cooling but to look at it that way, what a crazy amount. And in my mind, isn't this something George Bush could get behind? Maybe I am too optimistic but wasn't his whole problem with the Kyoto Protocol that limits on emissions would hurt the economy? I don't think that building according to "greener" codes would hurt the economy because we're still building but now people can afford their utility bills and we cut emissions!! What do you think? Do you think people would be more willing to buy a more expensive house with less expensive utility bills, rather than give up their car?