Shell just submitted a proposal to the Department of the Interior, which calls for ten new exploratory wells in the Arctic Ocean.  They claim that the operations will be completely “safe and clean”, but are in fact based on the same flawed methods that caused the oil spill in the Gulf.
While the Department of the Interior is considering Shell’s proposal they have opened up a public comment period to hear from us. But we only have 24 hours before the comment period closes so it is important that we send them in now!

One single oil spill could completely destroy this fragile ecosystem forever.

Join me in sending a comment to Secretary Salazar today to reject Shells proposal to drill in the Arctic by clicking the link below…

http://us.greenpeace.org/site/Advocacy?cmd=display&page=UserAction&id=865&s_src=taf

I recently installed a Wifi Thermostat in my condo. A programmable thermostat is a must, for the following reasons:

• Turn off the AC / Heat while you’re at work
• Cool off the apartment before you return
• Save a LOT of money

A lot of people leave their temperature at the same setting all day and night. This is a terrible waste of energy. It is much more cost effective to cool it when you are returning home, and to turn off system when you leave in the morning. It is hard to remember to do it manually, so a programmable thermostat is significantly better.

I decided to one-up the programmable thermostat and completely geek it out with a wifi thermostat that one can control from their computer, Android or iphone.

The thermostat of choice was this one:

The CT30 from Radio Thermostat Company of America. Despite the cheesy 80′s sounding name which you may liken to other well known institutions like the Peanut Corporation of America or Yokogawa Corporation of America, this is a fine thermostat. The interface is well designed and the software is surprisingly good.

Installation

This thermostat was quite easy to install. You need to have a C-Wire in your condo, which is a 24V AC electric supply. It frequently comes from your HVAC unit directly. Most modern buildings have this wire. Our condominium, The Floridian, has a C-Wire ready to use.

Removal of the Old Thermostat

You should remove the old thermostat carefully. In case you find that your wiring isn’t up to snuff and you don’t have a C-Wire, you’ll want to put this back. I had a cheap, builders-grade digital thermometer with only two buttons. I kept it just to have a backup. It had some strange snaps in the back, but can be pried off with a flat screw driver:

Pry it off. It has two weird snaps holding it on:

Turn Off your CIRCUIT BREAKER!

Turn off the HVAC unit and any A/C Compressors you have. Hopefully they are on individual circuits and individually labeled. The C-Wire carries 24V of electricity and could give you a nasty jolt. It could kill your goldfish but is unlikely to kill you.

Prepare the new thermostat

Remove the old wall plate. Remove this carefully. In our condo, the builder had half-assed the job and hadn’t put any anchors into the wall. I also found out that there was a hidden aluminum junction box immediately behind the drywall which made it hard to add my own wall anchors. I highly recommend using molly bolts in drywall, otherwise any screws you install are apt to fall out with just a light tug.

Wiring and Mounting

Our building has a 5-wire system:

5-wire heat pump system with Auxiliary Heat

This means that a heat pump is used to raise and lower the temperature in the condo. When the temperature needs to be raised by more than 5 degrees, or the heat pump is malfunctioning for some reason, an electric Auxiliary heater kicks in as “emergency heat”. This heater consumes a lot of electricity and is expensive to run. Think about heating with a hair dryer. It is imperative to buy a thermostat that can have a meaningful relationship with the auxiliary heater.

Follow the instruction manual to wire it up and mount it to the wall using wall anchors. You may have to drill up to four small holes to install the wall anchors. They will help to keep the thermostat installed snugly against your wall. I was only able to install two wall anchors because of the pesky hidden aluminum junction box I spoke of before.

Final Product

Total Time: 45 Minutes

Total Cost: $130

Total Savings: $1m, at least. Per week.

In all seriousness, installing a programmable thermostat, even an ordinary one, will save you a lot of money on your energy bill. It will keep the apartment at your ideal temperature when you’re home, and at a more efficient temperature when you’re away. Don’t believe the myth that cooling your home all day while you are away is more efficient than turning on your AC 30 minutes before you come home. Nowadays, I can turn on the AC with my phone anytime I want.

Have you ever thought of installing a ceiling fan in your bedroom? It can keep your AC costs in the summer time down and make your bedroom more comfortable. Especially if your mate doesn’t like the same temperatures as you do. I am from Boston and she is from Colombia. At 60 degrees, I’m wearing shorts and a T-Shirt and she is searching for her Parka. The opposite goes for the hot, humid, DC summers.

Here is a little guide that may help you to install a ceiling fan in your bedroom. My situation was made easier by a concrete ceiling with a pre-drilled, sturdy electrical box. First of all, it is critical to have a tall and sturdy ladder. I tried at first with a 3-foot stepladder, but it would have been superhuman to lift the 40lb motor and tighten very small, very intricate screws standing on my tip-toes. Get a good ladder!

See what your mounting hardware looks like

Remove your existing light fixture to see what you will mount your ceiling fan to. Here in the Floridian, our ceilings are concrete and the builder installed some very solid electrical boxes. You shouldn’t feel scared to secure a spinning 40 pound contraption to the ceiling.

The boxes in our ceilings are made of sturdy plastic. It is hard to see in the picture, but it is well encased in concrete. The box has kind of a mushroom shape with the wider part at the top and encased in concrete, so it is unlikely to slip out. I used machine screws (not the provided wood screws) to secure the fan to the ceiling box.

You have to remove all of the existing light fixtures and hardware and stretch out the wires. In our building, you may see two “live ends”, where you can connect two separate fixtures, each controlled by a separate wall switch. See the picture below. This was a nice addition by the developer.

Two live ends.

Each with a separate wall switch.

Putting the heavy bits together

Do exactly as the manual says! The Hunter Fan that I bought had ~100 pieces and it wasn’t easy putting it together. But whenever I diverged from the instructions and did something of my own, it was bad… real bad. At one point I had to disassemble the whole body while it was hanging from the ceiling. I’d wired everything together and turned the switch and nothing happened. As it turns out, I didn’t push a “reset” button after changing the remote control frequency. 2 hour detour.

Building the heavy bits

Hanging and taking shape!

From Installing a Ceiling Fan

The final product!

The fan looks beautiful in our bedroom, matching the wood texture of the ceiling. I slept in comfort last night. It could have been the fan or the wine, but it was a lovely sleep nonetheless. The fan is a Hunter fan from LightingDirect.com and cost ~$320. Be sure to get a coupon from the internet. I used a 12″ downrod to lower it down from the ceiling. Lighting Direct recommends an 18″ downrod for 10-foot ceilings like mine, but I opted for a shorter one and like this look better. The fan ships with a ~4 inch downrod that is totally insufficient.

Give it a try, and leave a comment if you found this useful. It is very easy to install this in the Floridian condos in NW DC – no drilling, cutting, or excessive wiring needed.

Yesterday was my Master’s degree graduation ceremony from Harvard. I’m done!

 
 
These were three guys I’d had some classes with. Not too many folks I know graduated yesterday.

From Harvard Graduation

But plenty of others did graduate!

From Harvard Graduation

This guy is a hoot. He is the “High Sherriff of Middlesex County” and he comes to “Declare this meeting IN SESSION!!” He shouts it and raps his cane on the stage three times.

From Harvard Graduation

Asian Tiger Mom snuck into the student section.

From Harvard Graduation

And Placido Domingo came by to receive his honorary degree. He serenaded Ruth Bader Ginsburg when she came up for her honorary degree. She’s not my type, but what an impressive lady.

It feels great to be done!

I’m trying out a new wordpress plugin called “CommentLuv”. If you have a wordpress blog, then leave a comment here with the URL of your wordpress blog. It’ll do something cool.

My parents are here this weekend and we’re having a great time. They were sad when I left Boston, or at least my father was. I had a very interesting life change recently, some of you know what it was, and this is the first time my parents are coming to visit afterward. I’ll be writing a protected post about it shortly.

lolcats for a gray day.