"One Big Home" documentary shines light on one big American blight
Drive around your neighborhood this afternoon. It doesn't matter whether you're hitting the shore in areas of Connecticut or the 'burbs of Texas, where your great aunt lives. In Alice, Texas, for example, the "rich" part of town boasts ginormous homes with unfathomable amounts of square feet. As this blogger's mother put it, "Yes, but where are the trees?" That could be a metaphor for why big houses require a second look. Energy consumption for homes over even 3,000 square feet could fuel a small school, library, or train station. And massive home building oftentimes occurs in areas that can least afford the carbon footprint. For example, in 2009, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) compiled data that shows in Massachusetts, energy consumption is 22 percent greater on average than in the rest of the country. The EPA wrote: "Since the weather in Massachusetts and New England is cooler than other areas of the United States, space h...