Trade in your old water wasting toilets for a more efficient one through the Greater Gallatin Toilet Tradeout. Details here, or call Brian Heaston at (406) 582-2282 or Kent Madin at (406) 595-2310.

Did you know that we Montanans contribute an average of 36 tons of CO2 per person per year, nearly double the US average? This ranks Montana as one of the worst emitters of CO2 in the US, according to the Dept of Energy. If Montana were a country, we'd be the 4th highest per capita CO2 emitter in the world, right behind Qatar (69), Kuwait (38), and the United Arab Emirates (37). Since CO2 is the primary greenhouse gas that is causing global warming, the choices we make today have a big impact on our world tomorrow.

A few years ago, we bought a turn of the century house in the historic district of Bozeman, Montana. When we decided to renovate the cozy, but energy wasting house, we decided to "green" it up - both the paint on the exterior, and the philosohy of the renovation.

In this day of human-caused climate change, rising energy costs and dependency on imported fossil fuels, our primary goal was to make the slightly sagging, out-of-date home, more energy efficient. At the same time we wanted to use "eco-friendly" and "sustainable" building materials. We wamted to lower our water consumption, harness solar power for heat and electricity, and use local materials whereever possible. We also wanted our daughter to grow up in a home that had fewer toxic chemicals, such as formaldehyde, in the building materials. Oh, and we wanted our house to look nice too.

We had no idea how challenging this would prove to be.

Like other towns in the Rocky Mountain region, Bozeman has been growing rapidly, and growth brings with it problems. While we know how special a place our town is, in manys ways we are a typical American community. We're sprawling, congested, subdivided, caffinated, and we even have those not particularly green big box stores - Home Depot, Lowes, Bed Bath and Beyond, Pier One, Cost Plus, Walmart, Costco, Target.

Bozeman is also fortunate to have the innovative and very green Refuge Sustainable Building Materials. In many ways it's Refuge that inspired us to renovate our home. If you haven't been there, put it on your list of things to do. Many of the materials we reference within this website can be found at Refuge.

Our renovation was also inspired by Corey Williamson's Make My House Green project. Corey, a real estate agent in Missoula, wanted to bring attention to green construction methods in Missoula, and with the successful completion of that project, Cory is now moving to Bozeman where he plans to organize a Make My House Green project here too.

BozemanHouse.com documents what we learned obout sustainable building during our house renovation: alternative energy systems such as photovoltaic and solar thermal hot water systems, hydronic radiant floor heating, heat exchangers, gray water recycling, concrete floors, recycled content countertops, super insulation and much more. By sharing our experiences with our neighbors, we hope it might help make YOUR renovation or building project a little more green and a little less painful.

BozemanHouse.com includes an easy to use resource list of green building materials, builders, subcontracrors and practices, specifically focusing on the climate and lifestyle we enjoy in Southwestern Montana. To better illustrate the green renovation of a typical house, Bozemanhouse.com also includes our running commentary and personal obervations during the renovation of our own house in Bozeman.

Your neighbors,

Ron Gompertz and Michelle Gantt
BozemanHouse.com
Bozeman, MT