A rabid environmentalist, John Shea would usually bristle at the glimpse of a construction site in the country.
But Shea–who spends a great deal of his earnings restoring an environmental balance on his 110-acre property off Three Mile Road–has found a particular peace of mind in his own $110,000 home remodeling project.
That’s because in rebuilding his 1950s ranch home, Shea has used durable materials that are either going to last several generations, are recyclable, or are made of renewable resources.
Not to mention that when it’s done, he’ll be burning less fossil fuel than a Yugo coming down a mountain pass with a tail wind. The house will cost less to heat for the season than staying one night in a fancy hotel and–as he already does now–Shea will be selling electricity back to the power company.
Nobody will ever have to back a garbage bin up to the house to remodel it again. For instance, Shea replaced asphalt roofing shingles with cedar shakes that will last a lot longer and serve another purpose when they’re spent as roofing material.
“Fifty years from now when we need a new roof, you could take off the shingles and burn them in the fireplace. They’re not going to a landfill,” Shea said emphatically.
A pediatric dentist with one of the biggest individual practices in the Milwaukee area, Shea, 43, had the spare cash to make an environmental, rather than fashion statement with this project.
Instead of erecting an ostentatious facade or a wing of huge bedrooms or a great room, Shea is adding only 600 square feet and no new bed or living rooms to the home he shares with wife Laurel and daughter Jamie. When it’s completed in a few months, the home will make better use of the energy-friendly subterranean space and the two bedrooms will be enlarged slightly.
Most people may see it as a bad investment to roll this much money into what will remain a small home by today’s standards. A Realtor might suggest that adding several rooms and ditching the composting toilet could have given the Shea house a better resale value.
But resale isn’t Shea’s concern. Not in the current economy anyway.
“I don’t think that the world is going to end tomorrow and I’d like to be able to have something left for my descendants,” he said. “My hope is that people learn through example and where possible try to help others.”
Shea learned what he knows about energy conservation through the Midwest Renewable Energy Association, which holds an annual national energy fair in the tiny central Wisconsin town of Amherst, near Stevens Point. And he felt that he needed to act on what he’s learned about restricting his reliance on fossil fuels.
Shea admits his example of energy efficiency comes at quite a cost. But if his financial wherewithal can save fuel and show others how to do the same, he’s happy to foot the bill. When it’s completed, the Sheas may open their house to tours for those interested in energy efficient building practices.
“I have a peace of mind that I didn’t ignore what these people had told me. With knowledge comes responsibility,” Shea said while pointing out the building techniques that will eventually make his 1,800-square-foot home nearly self sufficient. The year-long rebuilding project is about 75 percent complete.
“Realizing the danger of coming off as too self righteous, I want people to think about construction to minimize the impact on the environment,” Shea continued. “The age of urbanization is here, as much as I would like to forestall it. If they’re going to build, let them build efficiently.”
Shea did a little more research than your average homeowner when he decided to remodel. He took a course on energy efficient building from the Amherst builder, Gimme Shelter, one of a handful of Wisconsin companies specializing in solar-powered, super-insulated homes.
Then he took a basic carpentry course at the Milwaukee Area Technical College, a step most folks might think of as overkill for a homeowner not planning to be the hammer swinger in a project like this. But Shea found it invaluable to compare typical construction with the techniques taught at Amherst.
“We took a field trip to a home being constructed in Franklin. The house was huge with truly a poverty of construction,” he said. “The roof was already starting to sag between the rafters. As nice as it looked, you knew major defects will show in 10 to 15 years.”
Shea’s father, Yale Shea, a civil engineer, drew the plans for expanding the 1,200-square-foot home. Then they were tweaked by Bill Pfeifer, a part-time Union Grove contractor hired by Shea because he was flexible and interested in learning about energy efficient building.
Pfeifer is the assistant director for buildings and grounds at Mount Mary College in Milwaukee. He hopes to become a full-time home builder and thinks the energy efficient specialty will help him reach that goal.
In Shea, Pfeifer found a contractor’s patron of sorts. Shea encouraged the builder to learn the Amherst techniques and give attention to details. The experience has won Pfeifer over to the environmentalist’s way of thinking and the two are discussing a second project in which Pfeifer will convert an old barn on the property into his own super-insulated home.
According to Pfeifer, the basics of the home’s efficiency are found in insulation factor levels of R-30 in the walls and R-60 in the ceilings. Heat loss resistance factors of 19 are considered efficient by the building industry.
A constant vapor barrier and a construction method in which the perimeter of the floors don’t touch the outside walls further restrict heat loss and the roof angle is designed to let in as much sun as possible during the cold months.
Materials were chosen for their durability and low environmental impact. Ceramic tile was used over linoleum because it will last forever and stores some of the solar heat. The same is true for choosing hardwood flooring over carpeting.
There will be no carpeting in the house because it uses chemical dyes and winds up in the landfill when it wears out, Pfeifer said.
The new heat plant is a solar system in which 300 feet of tubes transfer hot water from solar collectors into a 14-by-21-foot sand pit under part of the basement floor. Stored in four feet of sand, the warmth radiates up through the house long after the sun has gone down.
Further heat is provided by two wood stoves. With an air-to-air heat exchanger recirculating warm air through the house, Shea anticipates being able to remove his standard furnace.
Additional power is supplied by a wind generator erected near the house. On windy, sunny days, Shea’s power plant sends electricity back to the power company. On other days power is drawn from the electric company. When the ledger is balanced, Shea expects the power company will pay him a few hundred dollars a year.
Perhaps the most interesting addition to the house was made a few years ago, an elaborate composting toilet which turns human waste into high-powered fertilizer. A standard-looking toilet on the ground level opens up to a huge heavy plastic bin in the basement, where the solid and liquid waste are separated and allowed to break down into an odorless, nutrient-rich organic material and a “manure tea,” spread over the family garden.
Sawdust is poured into the toilet over the brown waste. Then red worms introduced into the compost accelerate the decomposition process. As it decomposes, the mix rolls down an incline in the enclosed bin. Shea shovels out only 100 pounds of organic material each year to keep the toilet working.
The whole environmental-friendly system was a revelation to Pfeifer.
“Since I’ve met John, he’s convinced me,” said Pfeifer, who with Shea tediously reused old rafters and wall studs in the new construction. The old insulation was given to an area farmer to improve the energy efficiency of his home. All the scrap wood is being burned in a wood stove to provide heat.
Homeowners contemplating building don’t need to go to the extremes Shea has to wind up with an energy efficient home, said Jim McKnight, of Gimme Shelter, who teaches the Amherst courses.
While the Shea home is a model of efficiency, new home buyers can get similar results for $3 to $5 per square foot over standard construction costs, McKnight said. One of Gimme Shelter’s super insulated homes, featured in the current issue of Solar Today magazine, is 3,000 square feet and costs $180 per year to heat.
The key to the success of Gimme Shelter’s techniques, developed by Canadian builders about a decade ago, is that they can be used in homes with a conventional appearance. That’s important when it comes time to get a home loan.
The last thing a bank officer wants to see in a prospective mortgage is a home built into the earth or constructed with walls of recycled tires. The Gimme Shelter homes can be built with the ultimate insulation and heating systems in popular styles from Victorian to contemporary.
“Our system is designed to be commercially viable and efficient at the same time,” McKnight said.
Gimme Shelter’s two-day energy efficiency classes are designed so consumers can work with contractors to use the frugal techniques on their new home construction. In the course, which costs $200, students spend one day in the classroom and one day touring several energy efficient homes near Stevens Point. Information is available through the Midwest Renewable Energy Association office, (715) 824-5166.
“We want you to take enough information away to do your own house or have a good bulk of information to communicate to your builder,” McKnight said. Some of the advice is as simple as how to orient a home on the lot to take advantage of solar heat. Other information is more complex, like how to install a solar hydronic heating system or choosing the best insulation materials.
John Shea wants his neighbors to learn how to save fossil fuels and live more frugally. He makes the point that his energy conservation doesn’t do much good if everybody else is using up fuel as fast as they can.
“It’s important to me for people to see this technology and adopt it for themselves,” Shea said. “We’re all concerned about how much resources will be available for the next generation. If we use it all up, what a tragedy that will be.
“It’s an incredible high to be able to hold onto your idealism and put it into this house or another project,” Shea said of his personal cost-benefit analysis for a remodeling many would find ludicrous.
When Shea is gone, he hopes others have come around to his way of thinking about energy conservation and the practices he’s using now will be something for real estate agents to boast about.
