Energy Efficiency and Mother Earth

 For a year now, Antithesis Research has been working on the “Sustainability” issues contained in the desired outcomes of the community challenge grant issued by HUD/EPA/DOT.  Sustainable living as we know it is nothing more than “traditional knowledge” partnered with modern technology. One of the tasks that we have been working on under the grant is Housing & Energy Efficiency; we have been asking what the community wanted in terms of “future” energy sources and we have also considered what the social and economic costs/benefits are associated with alternative energy sources.

Over the last year the Federal and State governments have flooded email boxes around the country with various funding and grant opportunities for wind, solar, and bio-fuels facilities to name only a few. However, regardless of the system producing the electricity or the fuel, the consumer is still expected to pay for the energy product when consumed. According to wind and solar power maps produced by various government entities the Spokane Indian Reservation is not an ideal location for maximum power productivity.

How much do you currently pay for propane or electricity? The Spokane Indian Housing Authority is aggressively trying to get heating bills down to $50-60.00 per month. An answer to the problem of high energy bills is to become less dependent upon the energy grid.  This is possible by using stored solar heat from the earth’s crust in combination with properly insulated homes.  The type of technology that can significantly reduce monthly bills associated with heating and cooling is called Ground-Source Heat Pumps or GSP’s (see figure 1). GSP’s literally transfer the stored heat energy from deep in the ground (plugging into mother earth if you will) and moves that heat into the home through and exchanger. In the summer months the heat pump can transfer heat back into the ground for cooling. As part of the grant and working together as a community, HUD offered a solution to this technologic hurdle. As part of our training under the grant, HUD has agreed to allow some AR staff to go and get GSP certification training so that the technology can be taken advantage of here at home.  We are working closely with SIHA and expect the first couple of systems to be installed in rental units. However, we will be making this heat/cooling technology upgrade available to home buyers and current owners as well, on and off the reservation starting mid-summer 2012.

We will be releasing more information in the months ahead.

Figure 1: Schematic of a ground source heat pump system hooked up to a suitably insulated home. Thanks to some HUD funding, requests by SIHA,  community input, and tribal council this technology is coming to the reservation.

Scott Radford

Antithesis Research

Housing Survey Preliminary Results

Antithesis Research started the Housing Element of the Sustainable Community Project at the beginning of April 2012.  Since then we have distributed over 1000 surveys through mailers, email blasts, listening posts at the Trading Post, at community events, and at the Arby’s Grand Opening.  By May 1, 2012 we had collected 170 surveys, so if you still have your survey please fill it out and return to AR staff.  What we are trying to find out from the community is what aspects of their current housing do they like, what don’t they like, and what changes if any would they like to see in future housing built for the Tribe.  The information provided in the survey responses will be used to create alternative culturally relevant housing designs, inform policy makers as to what needs and concerns the community has regarding housing, and will assist SIHA and the Tribe’s Planning Department in developing future housing.

Below are the preliminary results of a few questions from the survey:

Current Housing          

From the responses, 43% said they were not satisfied with their current living conditions and gave varying responses as to why they were not satisfied.  Including not having a place of their own, too many people living in a given space, their housing needed some repairs, or they were not living in the community they wanted.  The 57% that were satisfied with their current housing were satisfied because they had enough room for family, they liked the location of their home, or they were simply happy to have a place to stay.  

Cultural Questions

We asked several questions in our survey about if their current housing is or should be reflective of Spokane culture.  We also asked how can housing express and be reflective of Spokane Indian culture.  What we’ve heard is that 72% of the respondents thought that housing should reflect the cultural needs of the Spokane Tribe.  27% did not think that housing should reflect cultural needs.  Reasons people gave for their responses included that this decision should be up to the people living in the house, yes the housing needs to reflect that we are a social people, or they did not know how a house could reflect Spokane Indian culture. 

Utilities

We asked the community a range of questions in the utilities section of our survey about their current housing’s physical condition, current and preferred heating sources, water quality, sewer systems, ventilation, and access to telephone and internet.  When asked if they currently had internet access, 37% of the respondents did not have access.  When asked if they would like access to the internet 89% said they would. Even people who currently have some form of internet access, such as dial-up, said they would like to have better internet access.  Currently those that do have internet access have the following; 19% have dial- up, 35% have broadband, 34% have satellite, and 12% did not know what type of internet connection they had. 

These are only a few of the questions that we gathered input from the community about. We will make available the results for all the questions once we have collected all remaining surveys.  If you are interested in viewing all the results and being part of Community Steering Committee who will tell us if these results are a true reflection of the community’s needs and desires, please join us May 29, 2012 at 10 a.m.  in the Administration Building – Bruce Wynne Room.  Thank you for taking the time to give us your input by filling out the Housing Element Survey. 

Richard Knott

Community Liaison

Antithesis Research