It started with gray water, then escalated to chickens, composting toilets and rain barrels. I'm talking about the two years I've spent transforming my humble California bungalow into a test case for sustainable living — an experience that's cost me hundreds of hours of my time and thousands of dollars, an endeavor that has tested the limits of not only my checkbook but also my sanity — and my DIY skills.

When I launched the Realist Idealist column, the idea was to look at environmentally promising home improvement projects through the eyes of a budget-minded consumer. I had seen so much media coverage that heaped praise on newly constructed eco-manses or expensive retrofit products, but the stories didn't answer my biggest question: For the green-minded person writing the checks, are the improvements worth the time, effort and expense?

Keep reading this story on what's been worth the money and effort, and what hasn't when it comes to the two year eco-living experiment.

-- Susan Carpenter

Photos from left to right: Composting, rain barrels and chickens are three green projects the author tackled in the past two years. Credits: Don Kelsen / Los Angeles Times

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Archived Realist Idealist columns

 

 

About a year ago, our uber-green home improvement and sustainable living columnist Susan Carpenter installed home solar panels thinking they would eventually power the electric car she hoped to buy. As she explains in this week's installment of her Realist Idealist column, she could have saved money if she had done it in reverse: bought the car first, and then put the solar panels in.

To find out why, you can watch the video below, or click here to read the column.

-- Deborah Netburn

In the latest installment of the Realist Idealist, our conservation-oriented columnist Susan Carpenter takes on yet another water-saving  project. She writes:

A few months ago I decided to replicate the pilot rainwater harvesting program that the L.A. Bureau of Sanitation kicked off in Mar Vista last July. The $1-million program outfitted 600 homes with one 55-gallon rain barrel and provided free downspout diversions, plus installation. What the city hoped to get in return was 584,100 gallons of rain stored annually that could be used for outdoor irrigation instead of flowing over paved surfaces, picking up contaminants and flushing out to the ocean untreated. During L.A.’s rainy season, more than 100 million gallons of untreated storm water flow out to the ocean every day.

Click here to see the full story and read how this endeavor turned out. To read Carpenter's other columns breaking down the labor and financial cost of greening a home, click here for our story gallery.

-- Deborah Netburn

Photo: Carpenter's 55-gallon rain barrel is filled with a downspout from the roof. Photo credit: Don Kelsen / Los Angeles Times

What's in those bags of soil we buy at garden centers? Scotts, the company that makes soils under the Miracle-Gro, EarthGro and SuperSoil brands, uses discarded grape skins and seeds from Napa Valley, rice hulls from Stockton, even pecan and walnut shells. Other brands might contain bat guano, chicken manure, Canadian peat moss, Sri Lankan coconut coir or Norwegian kelp meal.

Susan Carpenter, who writes The Realist Idealist column on green home improvement and sustainable living, looks into bagged soil and how it's made for her latest report. It's a follow-up to her experience this summer, when Carpenter grew some beautiful chard in raised beds filled with store-bought soil -- then discovered her leafy greens were abnormally high in lead. For this latest column, she and colleague Don Kelsen also produced a video from their visit to one of the California facilities where bagged soil is made. Read Carpenter's findings, and then if you're eager to test your soil, click here.

For some gardeners, the bagged stuff just can't compare with homemade compost. The problem, of course, is that compost takes time and patience. For so many households, those food scraps are more likely to land in a garbage bag than a worm tray. Earlier this week Emily Green reported on San Francisco's new mandatory food-scrap recycling program and why our neighbors up north have pulled ahead of L.A. in the quest to divert trash from landfills. You can read that column by clicking here and see the archive of Green's weekly column on sustainable landscaping, The Dry Garden, by clicking here. 

Ask three experts for their recipe for the perfect potting mix, and you'll get three answers. That's what Ilsa Setziol did, and the three recommendations for the ultimate potted-plant dirt are revealed here.

-- Craig Nakano

Photo illustration credit: Kirk McKoy / Los Angeles Times

If you're looking to help save the planet--and some of your hard-earned cash--you can start at home. Starting Wednesday, Sept. 30 (from noon to 10 p.m.) and daily through Sunday, Oct. 4 (from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m.), the "Change The World, Start With Energy Star" demonstration house will be on site as part of the Going Green exhibition at the Los Angeles County Fair in Pomona.

Experts will be on hand to discuss the energy and money savings of properly maintained heating and cooling systems, programmable thermostats, and Energy Star-rated appliances, electronics and home office equipment. 

Here's just one of the exhibit's light bulb-over-your-head recommendations: If every home in the U.S. replaced just one traditional incandescent bulb with a compact fluorescent one, the annual energy savings would be $700 million a year in energy costs and prevent 9 billion pounds of greenhouse gas emissions--about 800,000 cars' worth--each year.  

If you can't make it out to the fair, don't despair. The illustration above links to a cool interactive map of a home that offers valuable tips for conserving energy inside and out. 

--David A. Keeps

Photo credit: Energy Star

When Home section columnist Susan Carpenter launched the Realist Idealist, the concept was simple: Write about green home improvement and sustainable living from a typical consumer's point of view. Green design can be great, but how much does it cost? What benefit will it yield? What are the potential pitfalls I may face along the way, and how can I solve them in the most ecologically conscious, least expensive way?

Yeah, simple. As her latest piece proves, good intentions can go off track really quickly. When Carpenter decides to switch from low-water landscaping to fruit and vegetable gardening, she encountered problems before the shovel hits the soil:

Like a lot of L.A. dirt, mine was a victim of our car culture, containing high, unhealthful levels of zinc (from brake dust) and lead (from leaded gasoline). If I was going to farm my property, I had two options: Build raised beds or remediate the soil by growing a cover crop that would suck up the metals. I chose option No. 2.

The photo of Carpenter's garden above is your hint that perhaps option No. 2 didn't go so well. To read more about what she did and why, read the latest installment of the Realist Idealist. We also have the column archived, with previous pieces on gray water, solar panels, chickens and so-called green cleaners.

Want to find out how you can test your soil for contaminants? Click to the jump for information on testing companies and their fees.

-- Craig Nakano

Photo credit: Ken Hively / Los Angeles Times