Green Project Marketing Blog

Landmark Apartment Retrofit Agreeement

After a year-long debate, the Los Angeles City Council agreed on the city to begin implementing the most sweeping mandatory seismic laws in the nation. Los Angeles renters and apartment owners must equally share the financial burden of earthquake retrofitting, the

After many housing studies and heated meetings with landlord and tenant groups, city staff proposed a compromise that the City Council unanimously voted to move forward: Owners can pass half the retrofit costs to tenants through rent increases over a 10-year period, with a maximum increase of $38 per month.

Dingbat Apartments

"Dingbat" apartments throughout Los Angeles pose an immediate risk to tenants due to potential collapse as what occurred in the 1994 earthquake.

A dingbat is a type of apartment building that flourished in the Sun Belt region of the United States in the 1950s and 1960s. It has a distintive shoebox style of the stereotypical construction of a stucco box. Dingbats are boxy, two- or three-story apartment houses with overhangs sheltering street-front parking.

For more information, please review link HERE:

The city of Los Angeles and the Metropolitan Water District disagree over whether the names and addresses of people and companies who received turf removal rebates from the MWD should be made public. The skirmish points to a growing debate state wide about whether water-related data should be more transparent.

The Metropolitan Water District spent more than $340 million on its popular turf removal program. After initially withholding the information, Metropolitan told the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power it intended to release first and last names of applicants and recipients of turf rebates, as well as specific street addresses, in response to requests made under the California Public Records Act.

This makes sense as there is debate on how many parties and what, if any, connections, were in place when these monies were doled out.

As a result, homeowners and businesses that have received rebate money could find their data made public within a week.

“We believe this is public information because it involves the use of public funds,” said Bob Muir, with the Metropolitan Water District.

Green Project Marketing has been partnering with Enovative Group and Evolution Energy Solutions on MWD and LADWP as well as through other water districts to replace older 3.5gpf and 1.6gpf toilets with new, lower 1.28 and even 1.0gpf high efficiency toilets.

A High-Efficiency Toilet (HET) flushes at 1.28 gallons per flush or less. The average water savings for HETs is estimated to be between 4,000 to 19,000 gallons per year depending on the type of non-efficient toilet that you are replacing. This equals an estimated saving of 22 gallons per day (gpd) when replacing a non-efficient toilet.

High-Efficiency Toilets are available in Gravity-Fed, Pressure Assist, Flush Valve and Dual-Flush models.

High Efficiency Toilet rebates must have a matching bowl & tank or matching bowl & flushometer valve.

The Metropolitan Water District of Southern California is a consortium of 26 cities and water districts that provides drinking water to nearly 19 million people in parts of Los Angeles, Orange, San Diego, Riverside, San Bernardino and Ventura counties.

Contact us today at 800-260-6008 ext 301 to learn more about the program and to take advantage of the savings on precious water.

Multi-family building owners are having their water bills skyrocket. Sub-metering is coming on to the scene slowly and NOW is the time to reduce water bills, lower operating expenses and increase the value of each property.

Well, the big boys have taken most of the dough... the program has assisted many homeowners, but the golf courses, large companies have taken a disproportionate amount of the pie.

Will more $$$ come to residential market? Maybe. I think the program will be re-evaluated for its quality and water savings.

Due to an overwhelming response, the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California shut down its turf removal rebate program Thursday because it ran out of money, the district announced.

The water agency burned through the last $150 million in the past seven weeks, after the board added $350 million to the fund on May 26, 2015.

All funds have been allocated either for completed projects or for those with approved projects awaiting completion, the agency said.

“We knew that the popularity of the turf program would exhaust the available funds at some point, but even we didn’t predict just how popular turf rebates would become,” said Jeffrey Kightlinger, MWD general manager.

The water agency officially closed the popular turf rebate program to new applications at 1 p.m., Coffelt said. The program was predicted to last at least through the end of the year. New applicants are being placed on a stand-by list and could be slotted into the landscape-changing program if others drop out of the queue. Coffelt said about 20 percent to 30 percent sign up but end up dropping out.

MWD’s program, which totaled $450 million, was the largest of its kind in the nation. Kightlinger said the program will result in the removal of more than 150 million square feet of turf — three times what Gov. Jerry Brown had asked for when he issued his executive order on April 1 requiring all Californians to cut water use by 25 percent to help the state weather a severe drought.

The program will save 80,000 acre-feet of water, equal to the amount of water provided to 160,000 households in one year, she said. “It is a significant amount,” Coffelt said.

Because MWD funded the program, its 28 water agency members most likely won’t be able to continue giving out turf-removal rebates.

For example, the Upper San Gabriel Valley Municipal Water District, which covers an area of 1 million people in Los Angeles County, said it could no longer give out turf-removal rebates, sometimes known as cash for grass. Rebates amounted to $2 per square foot or up to a maximum of $6,000 per household.

During the 2014-15 fiscal year, the district saw a 1,200 percent increase in residential rebates over last year, said Shane Chapman, USGVMWD general manager.

“The rebate program was intended to stimulate interest in turf removal to the point that government incentives were not necessary for the long term,” Kightlinger said.

Metropolitan will continue giving out rebates for other water-saving devices such as water-efficient clothes washers, toilets and outdoor irrigation controllers through its website www.bewaterwise.com. The agency has about $50 million left for these rebates, Coffelt said.

Thanks to the MWD folks for approving $350mm more in rebate funding.

Green Project Marketing and its partners are working hard to assist consumers and businesses with turf removal, toilet retrofits to reduce water usage.

It's first come first serve out here in the Wild, Wild West - so any parties interested should move NOW and visit the SoCalWater$mart pages - Click HERE to reach this page. Then go to residential or commercial to fill out application, provide images, etc. to ensure square footage or number of toilets have been reserved.

For the turf removal, the MWD board was correct to reduce commercial rebates as they were taking too much of the pie - $1/square foot up to $25,000 annual maximum.

For residences, now $2.00 sq. ft, up to $6,000 max.  LADWP is offering the $1.75/sq. ft incentive bringing a 1,500 sq. ft. project to $5,625 rebate.

Take advantage of this program today as funding reserves will fill up fast.

MWD claims in the article, if the agency were to continue funding the program at $450 million after this year, it would result in a "very significant" rate increase — or about 7% for every $100 million in funding.

C'mon folks!  Hey, it's been done before and is being done now. We love that sewage water taste!

Actually, as will read in this article, through the water filtration process, this treated water can easily be better for you than your favorite out-of-the-supposed-spring-bottled water you gulp each day in your car or on the train... 

California and many states face water shortages that may be with us for the long haul.

All Californians can do a better job or collecting rainwater too - this may soften the palate if this can be converted into drinking water - Green Project Marketing represents a leading rainwater harvesting company that can make this a reality.

For you techie's out there, the process is pretty interesting for Toilet to Tap - here it goes...

In potable reuse systems, effluent from a wastewater treatment plant is sent to an advanced treatment facility, where it undergoes a three-step purification process.

Phase I - water is passed through a microfilter that blocks particles, protozoans or bacteria that are larger than 1/300^th the thickness of a human hair. Phase II - it undergoes even finer filtration in the form of reverse osmosis, in which water is forced through a membrane that blocks fertilizers, pharmaceuticals, viruses and salts. Phase III- ultraviolet light and hydrogen peroxide are used to break down any pathogens or organic compounds that escaped the first two steps.

The result is a purified substance that is cleaner than most bottled waters, according to WateReuse California, a group that advocates for water reuse and desalination. However, it is still sent to a traditional water treatment plant, where it is blended with other sources of water, processed and pumped to household taps.

For more information, please review LA Times article at: http://www.latimes.com/local/california/la-me-toilet-to-tap-20150525-story.html#page=1

When will it end???  Oil and energy companies believing that they are simply above the law. Out of one side of the mouth, "we place safety and the environment as a top priority.  Out of the other side of the mouth, rampant polluting of water ways, water tables and communities, that have short and long term health implications for animals and people.

From article on 5/14/15 - WASHINGTON – Three subsidiaries of North Carolina-based Duke Energy Corporation, the largest utility in the United States, pleaded guilty today to nine criminal violations of the Clean Water Act at several of its North Carolina facilities and agreed to pay a $68 million criminal fine and spend $34 million on environmental projects and land conservation to benefit rivers and wetlands in North Carolina and Virginia. Four of the charges are the direct result of the massive coal ash spill from the Dan River steam station into the Dan River near Eden, North Carolina, in February 2014. The remaining violations were discovered as the scope of the investigation broadened based on allegations of historical violations at the companies’ other facilities.

For more information, please review this article: http://yosemite.epa.gov/opa/admpress.nsf/0/12EC4ECA30BE9A5D85257E45006B4215

Over the last four years since its groundbreaking, the Bullitt Center has not disappointed.  There are so many wonderful systems in place on this property, but it is worth taking the time to read the various articles and technical specifications.

If you have been faithful to LEED for years, there may be some push back about learning more about The International Living Institute. Regarding the building's many features, click HERE to learn more. The International Living Future Institute is a hub for visionary programs.

It administers the Living Building Challenge^™, the built environment's most rigorous and ambitious performance standard. ILF is the parent organization for Cascadia Green Building Council, a chapter of both the United States and Canada Green Building Councils that serves Alaska, British Columbia, Washington and Oregon. It is also the home to Ecotone Publishing, a unique publishing house dedicated to telling the story of the green building movement's pioneering thinkers and practitioners.

I say keep up the good work, test, measure, promote, educate, incorporate into as many new buildings as possible - repeat the process.

Well, kudos to Gov. Brown for taking some drastic action on CA's water issues.

(photo credit: LA Times)

Californians do not know for sure what the latest drought cycle is, but we do know that it is time to take action to the next level.  Cities throughout the state have not been idle. There are amazing statistics on water usage reductions even though the population has increased steadily.

Here are some of the key actions taken by Sacramento:

Other elements of Brown's order would:

--Require golf courses, cemeteries and other large landscaped spaces to reduce water consumption.

--Replace 50 million square feet of lawn statewide with drought-tolerant landscaping as part of a partnership with local governments.

--Create a statewide rebate program to replace old appliances with more water- and energy-efficient ones.

--Require new homes to have water-efficient drip irrigation if developers want to use potable water for landscaping.

--Ban the watering of ornamental grass on public street medians.

--Call on water agencies to implement new pricing models that discourage excessive water use.

--Require agricultural to report more water usage information to the state so that regulators can better find waste and improper activities.

-Create a mechanism to enforce requirements that water districts report usage numbers to the state.

Sunset Green Home and CertainTeed Insulation have created a case study based on the product used for the project. The Case Study was presented at the 2015 IBS show in Las Vegas. The case study is called Follow the Project - Sunset Green Home.

Follow The Project and learn how a home in Long Island is being rebuilt intelligently with CertainTeed Insulation after Hurricane Sandy.

Learn more about the insulation product used:

• SMARTBATT™ - A revolutionary, one-of-a-kind fiber glass insulation with an integrated smart vapor retarder that blocks and breathes to manage moisture
• CertaSpray® - Spray Foam insulation that expands to fill every opening that can potentially leak air, resulting in a more energy-efficient living environment.
• Foritcel™ - A spray-applied mold prevention product for homes. No mold will grow on professionally treated surfaces.

You can review the CASE STUDY here.

For more information on the green building project, please visit, www.SunsetGreenHome.com.