Passive solar heating and passive cooling—approaches known as natural conditioning—provide comfort throughout the year by reducing, or eliminating, the need for fossil fuel. Yet while heat from sunlight and ventilation from breezes is free for the taking, few modern architects or builders really understand the principles involved.

Now Dan Chiras, author of the popular book The Natural House, brings those principles up to date

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"The Home Energy Diet helps readers take control of their personal energy use and costs so they can save money, live more comfortably, and help reduce environmental impacts. Energy specialist Paul Scheckel first explores energy literacy, and then describes how your home uses - and loses - energy you pay for. He encourages readers to learn about their own homes through easy-to-follow ways of measuring, metering, investigating, and considering habits...

"The Kitchen Connection Alliance, in close cooperation with the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, develops an international cookbook to support the way that we eat for ourselves and for the planet. Celebrity chefs, organic farmers, indigenous cooks, and food activists share their favorite entrées and side dishes that are not only healthy and delicious but also sustainable. This gorgeous cookbook features full-color photography...

Prefabrication offers a simple path to the green home of your dreams, and in her latest book, Prefabulous author Sheri Koones highlights the many ways of using prefabrication to create almost-off-the-grid homes—houses that are not only environmentally friendly but often operate at nearly zero annual energy cost. Taking energy from the grid when necessary and returning any excess energy produced, almost-off-the-grid homes function on a fraction...

Designed for individuals with basic handyperson skills, this DVD provides step-by-step procedures for weatherizing attic hatches or pull-down attic stairs, air sealing plumbing and wiring penetrations in the attic and basement, weatherizing bulkhead doors and other exterior doors, plugging air leaks along the box sills, and installing an interior storm window, among other tips.

In 2008, the best-selling The Transition Handbook suggested a model for a community-led response to peak oil and climate change. Since then, the Transition idea has gone viral across the globe, from Italian villages and Brazilian favelas to universities and London neighborhoods. In contrast to the ever-worsening stream of information about climate change, the economy, and resource depletion, Transition focuses on solutions, on community-scale responses,...