This morning after grabbing my first cup of joe at work I received a message from one of our community members John J. Jerabek alerting me to a research doc that NASA put together. So I hunkered down at my desk preparing myself for a 50 page report; to my surprise it was concise, to the point and contained some great information I haven’t seen before about going green at home.
The article John sent over talks about Bill Woverton, an environmentalist who worked with the U.S. military to find ways to clean up the mess left by biological warfare. One amazing finding that Woverton came across during his stint with the military was plants that could actually eliminate Agent Orange. Woverton left the military and soon after received funding from NASA to start running some new experiments which focused around the topic “If man is to move into closed environments, on Earth or in space, he must take along nature’s life support system.” i.e. plants.
Based on Woverton’s research at NASA and now his own organization Wolverton Environmental Services Inc., he published some of his findings in “How to Grow Fresh Air: 50 Houseplants That Purify Your Home or Office.” and “Growing Clean Water: Nature’s Solution to Water Pollution,” for consumers to start utilizing his findings in their homes. Woverton had many amazing breakthroughs but his recent research is what took me by surprise.
“On the home front, in a partnership with Syracuse University, Wolverton Environmental is engineering systems consisting of modular wicking filters tied into duct work and water supplies, essentially tying plant-based filters into heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) systems. This whole-building approach has recently been licensed by Wolverton to Phytofilter Technologies Inc., of Saratoga Springs, New York, which is currently constructing a prototype of a system that is intended to clean the water and air circulation systems of entire buildings using the natural abilities of plants. The design includes units that are built into existing HVAC units. The plants can be placed throughout buildings, in atriums, or in roof gardens and then hooked into the building’s HVAC units through forced-air filters.”
Wolverton Environmental Services Inc. designed this sustainable ecosystem to show how a building’s circulation system and a rooftop garden could work in tandem to clean indoor air.
What’s so amazing about this system is that it directly ties making your home more energy efficient to the shell of your home. When you make retrofits or seal up the shell of your home, you’re reducing the amount of natural air flow through out the house. If a home is sealed too tightly you can come across major health issues such as the sick building syndrome. With Woverton’s findings he might be able to make homes more energy efficient by allowing a home’s shell to be sealed tighter without increasing the risk of health issues. Moreover his solution doesn’t call for more obtrusive materials in your home that increase your carbon foot print or energy consumption. Woverton has been discovering amazing technological advances by going back to the natural basics.
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Elliott Lemenager –