I'd Like to Take a Moment...
...to talk about the Bigelow House and the role of Historic Preservation in Green Building.
The Bigelow House, an important cultural landmark in the city, will be a prominent site on this year's South Sound Green Tour, sponsored by the Olympia Heritage Commission and Thurston County Solid Waste.
You may ask "How can a 150 year old house be considered 'Green' enough to be showcased on the Tour? Won't it be drafty and cold?"
Possibly, but retrofitting a historic building is always worth the costs. Why? Because of embodied energy.
If you remember Newton's Laws, he posits energy can never be created or destroyed, only changed in form, like from a tree into a house. What this means is that no new house can ever use less energy than an already standing structure, because 150 years ago a man took the time to convert the potential energy of some wood and stone into a well-crafted structure.
Sure you can build something new, but ignoring the embodied energy of a historic house is just wasteful. So, historic preservation.
But that's a whole other story.
Come see the Bigelow House and learn about Energy Efficient Historic Preservation on the South Sound Green Tour, April 21st and 22nd!
